Misunderstandings
by Don Sample
Summary: An ancient ruin on a deserted island brings SG1 into contact with the Scoobies. Is the threat extra, or subterrestrial? Post season 7 of Buffy, Stargate season 5
1. Something Strange on P3G823

**Chapter 1: Something Strange on P3G-823**

Daniel Jackson looked up from his notes when he heard the sound of someone loudly clearing his throat. "Hmm? What do you want Jack? I'm kinda in the middle of something here."

Colonel Jack O'Neill was leaning casually against the door frame with his hands in the pockets of his BDU. "I'm here to remind you that you have a briefing scheduled with the General."

"Oh, right, yeah. I'll be there."

"It started five minutes ago," said Jack.

"_What?_" Daniel quickly looked at his watch. "Oh, sorry, I kinda got wrapped up in the translations from P3G-823. I lost track of the time." He quickly gathered up half a dozen scattered folders from his desk. "I'm coming." He got up from his chair, and came around to the door.

Jack waved Daniel ahead of him as he left his office. "After you. The General threatened to bust me down to airman if he saw me again first."

"I'm really sorry about this, Jack," said Daniel as he moved quickly toward the main conference room of the SGC.

"I know, that's what you always say," said Jack. "Don't worry about it. You got me out of listening to Carter explain her latest theory. If I've timed this right, she'll just be finishing up when we get there."

Daniel pushed open the conference room door. "…which should increase the efficiency of our naquadah reactors by better than ten percent," said Major Carter as he entered the room.

Daniel took a quick look around. In addition to Sam and the General, Teal'c, Dr. Fraiser, and the other SG team leaders were all present. "I'm sorry I'm late, everyone." He took his seat beside Sam. "I got caught up in my translation of the P3G-823 carvings."

"Now that you are here, Dr. Jackson, perhaps you can give us your report on how that is progressing," said General Hammond.

"Yes, sir," said Daniel. "The script is a derivative of the Asgard, but the language itself doesn't seem to be closely related. More like someone took the Asgard alphabet, and adapted it to a different language. Kind of like Cyrillic is derived from the Greek alphabet."

"So, have you translated any of it?" asked Jack.

"I've gotten a good start, but I also found something else," said Daniel. "I'm not the first person to try to translate this language. A curator at the British Museum did a translation in 1995."

"_What?_" asked Jack. "How did some Brit translate something nine years before we found it on another planet?"

"Because there was a similar temple, here on Earth," said Daniel. "It was uncovered somewhere in the Shetland Islands, off the northern coast of Scotland."

"'Somewhere'?" asked Jack.

"Yeah, there was some sort of accident," said Daniel. "The team doing the excavation were all killed in 1992. Their boat sank in a storm when they were coming back to the mainland, they never had the chance to tell anyone the exact location, and no one has been able to find it since. All anyone had to work with were some photographs that were in their notes that washed up on the shore a couple of weeks later. They went to a curator at the British Museum. He published a paper about them, with his translation in '95."

"So, somewhere out there, off the coast of Scotland is a temple, that may be full of deadly alien technology?" asked Jack. They had barely gotten out of P3G-823 alive.

"That's right," said Daniel. "I'd like to contact this guy, and see if he's got anything that wasn't published. Maybe show him some of the photos we have of inscriptions, see what he thinks of them."

"You can't tell him where you found them," said General Hammond.

"Of course not," said Daniel. "According to his theory, the temple belonged to some sort of lost Norse sub-sect—the runes are similar to Norse runes, which are also derived from the Asgard. The Norse traveled all over northern and eastern Europe. I'll tell him that a similar find was discovered in Latvia, or some such."

"And if he wants to know exactly where, or why you can't tell him?" asked Jack.

"The countries that used to be part of the former Soviet Union have a thriving criminal underground," said Daniel. "Their criminals embraced capitalism a lot more quickly than their governments. Most archaeological discoveries there are looted by treasure and relic hunters before the legitimate researchers can do a proper excavation. This has made the legitimate researchers _very_ secretive when they find something really interesting. Dr. Giles will understand if I can't tell him just where this is."

"Dr. Giles?" asked Jack.

"Yes," said Daniel. "Dr. Rupert Giles."


	2. Oh Dear Lord

**Chapter 2: Oh Dear Lord!**

Dawn ran to pick up the ringing telephone, dressed in only a towel, and hoping that it wasn't a telemarketer that had pulled her out of her bath. "Giles residence." 

"May I speak with Dr. Rupert Giles?" asked the voice on the other end. 

"_Doctor_ Giles?" asked Dawn. 

"Yes," said the voice. The slight lag before his response, as well as his accent told Dawn that this was probably a trans-Atlantic call. "This is the home of the Rupert Giles who used to be a curator at the British Museum, isn't it?" 

"Uh, yeah," said Dawn. "I just never heard him called 'Doctor' before." 

"May I speak with him?" 

"I'm sorry," said Dawn. "He's not in right now. Can I take a message?" She reached for the pen and note pad that was by the phone. 

"Uh, yeah. Could you ask him to call Dr. Daniel Jackson?" 

Dawn wrote down his name and the phone number he gave her. "That's back in the States, right?" 

"That's right," said Daniel. "Colorado." 

"Cool!" said Dawn. "That's Mountain Time, right? Wouldn't want him calling you at 4AM." 

She could here the smile in Daniel's voice. "That's very considerate of you." 

"So what's this about?" asked Dawn. 

"Some colleagues of mine have found some temple carvings similar to ones that Dr. Giles wrote about in a paper in 1995," said Daniel. "I'd like to consult with him about the translation." 

"Oh yeah?" asked Dawn. "Where did they find it?" 

"Uh, Latvia," said Daniel. 

"Never been there," said Dawn. 

"Neither have I," said Daniel. "Um, I'd also like to send him some photographs of the engravings they found. Does he have an email address?" 

"Giles?" asked Dawn. "He's a major league technophobe. You can send them to me though. I'll see that he gets them." 

"I guess that will work," said Daniel. "What's your name, and email address?" 

* * *

Daniel was preparing to send off the package of photographs from P3G-823—stripped of anything that could indicate that they were taken on a different planet—when his phone rang. He picked it up. "Dr. Jackson." 

"This is Major Davis, Dr. Jackson." 

Daniel winced. Why would their Pentagon Liason Officer be phoning him? Paul Davis was a nice enough guy, but he tended to only show up, or call, when there was trouble. "How can I help you Major?" 

"You put through a request for a background check on a Rupert Giles?" 

"Uh, yes, I did. Is there a problem? He came back clean." 

"I just need to know _why_ you put through the request," said Major Davis. 

"He wrote a paper about a temple on Earth that contained carvings like those we found on P3G-823," said Daniel. "I want to consult with him about them." 

"You aren't telling him about the Stargate program," said Davis. 

"Of course not," said Daniel. "I'm telling him that some colleagues of mine found something similar in Latvia." 

Daniel could almost hear the wheels turning on the other end of the phone. "Go ahead," said Major Davis. "That shouldn't be a problem." 

"What is it about Rupert Giles prompted this phone call, Major?" asked Daniel. 

"I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to say, Doctor," said Major Davis. "Let's just say that Rupert Giles came in contact with another top secret operation a few years ago. It probably left a very sour taste in his mouth, where the military, and government are concerned." 

"What happened," asked Daniel. 

"I already told you that I can't discuss that," said Major Davis. 

"But it's still okay to send him this information?" asked Daniel. 

"Oh yes," said the Major. "As long as its origin is properly masked, Mr. Giles will probably draw a completely erroneous conclusion about where you really found it. Good day, Dr. Jackson." 

"Good day, Major." Daniel slowly replaced the receiver of his phone in its cradle, wondering what that conversation had really been about. He shrugged and sent off his email to Dawn Summers. 

* * *

"Honey, we're home!" called out Buffy as she came through the front door of the converted manor house that had become the new Watcher headquarters, near Westbury. 

"Was that really necessary?" asked Giles, as he followed her through the door. 

"Wouldn't want to surprise some Slayer wandering around in her underwear would you?" asked Buffy. 

Xander was following Giles through the door. "Actually…" He saw the look Buffy was giving him. "…no, I wouldn't want to do that." 

"In here!" called out Dawn's voice from the direction of the library. 

Buffy made her way through the house to its large library. The walls were lined with bookshelves, containing copies of all of the world's foremost volumes on demonology. She saw that Dawn was seated at the table in the center of the room, with several open books, and papers spread out around her. "Where is everybody?" 

"Willow's off with Althenea, and Kennedy took the Slayers for a run," said Dawn. 

"What's up with you?" asked Buffy. "Some new apocalypse?" 

"Nothing like that, I don't think," said Dawn. "An archaeologist back in the States phoned looking for Giles. Asking questions about a paper he wrote way back in the '90s. I thought I'd do a little research." 

Xander looked at all the books. "A _little?_" 

Dawn looked around, as if noticing for the first time just how many books she had out. "Uh…I guess I got carried away." 

Buffy grinned at her sister. "You don't say." 

"By the way, Giles, since when were you a Doctor?" asked Dawn. "This guy was looking for 'Dr. Giles'." 

"Um…Dr. Giles was a little overqualified to be a high school librarian, so I never mentioned my advanced degrees when I applied to Sunnydale High." Giles went to the table, and picked up one of the sheets of paper. "Who was looking for me?" 

"His name was Daniel Jackson," said Dawn. She waited for some response from the new head of the Council of Watchers. She didn't hear one. She looked up at him. "Giles?" 

Giles was looking at the sheet of paper in his hand. It was a printout of one of the pictures that Dr. Jackson had sent to her. His face had gone white. "Oh dear lord!" 


	3. I Hate When You Say That

**Chapter 3: I Hate When You Say That**

"I hate when you say that," said Xander. 

"Giles, what's wrong?" asked Buffy. 

"Where did he find this?" Giles asked Dawn. 

"He said it was from somewhere in Latvia," said Dawn. "He didn't seem to want to be more specific than that. What's wrong?" 

"This…" Giles waved the sheet of paper in his hand. "…is similar to some carvings found in an ancient temple that was uncovered in the Shetland Islands, over ten years ago. The archaeological team that was doing the excavation released…something…that killed them all. The Slayer at the time had a dream about it, and she and her Watcher went to investigate. They were never heard from again, and three days later her successor was called. We never learned exactly how she and her Watcher died, but it seems that she gave her life defeating whatever was unleashed there on that island. More Watchers were dispatched, I was among them; it was one of my first assignments. When we got to the scene, all we found were their bodies. 

"The Council decided to cover up what had happened. We reburied the temple, hiding all traces of it, buried all of the bodies at sea, and faked a boating accident which claimed their lives. Some preliminary photographs of the temple had been sent from the island, and we found more in the notes of the archaeological team. Too much was known about the find for us to make it seem like it had never happened, so I—using my position at the British Museum—was given the task of doing the public investigation of their findings. I published my results in 1995, taking some care to obfuscate a few of the details." 

"So, someone else has found the remains of this temple now?" asked Buffy. "If whatever killed them was defeated—" 

"No," said Giles. "It seems that someone has found _another_ temple. We have to find out where, before history repeats itself." 

* * *

Daniel's curiosity about Rupert Giles was piqued. Why would Major Davis be interested in a former curator of the British Museum? Some of the details that he had read in Giles' file were also rather curious. Why would a man with multiple degrees in history, mythology, and ancient languages leave a prime position at the British Museum, to become a high school librarian? 

Daniel's own personal history made him think that maybe Rupert Giles had come up with some theory that his colleagues thought was bizarre, or insane, but his search of the records showed that Giles' professional reputation was intact. While he hadn't published any papers since 1996, his last papers were well received, and his name still sometimes appeared in the journals, usually in letters giving thoughtful criticism of papers published by others. 

Something twigged in his memory. Daniel had been feeling like he knew the name 'Rupert Giles' ever since he had encountered it the other day, and now he remembered where he had seen it before. Giles had written some letters criticizing _his_ theories. He was one of the few people who had actually bothered to examine his evidence, and to judge his theories on their merits, rather than react with a knee-jerk 'this guy is nuts!' While Giles hadn't agreed with many of Daniel's conclusions (some of which, subsequent discoveries through the Stargate had proven to be false) he hadn't dismissed them, or Daniel's evidence, out of hand either, and had even come up with a few alternate interpretations of the evidence that turned out to be quite insightful. Giles' own interpretations tended to link the Egyptian gods with older legends of demons, rather than aliens from outer space though. 

* * *

"So, who is this Daniel Jackson?" asked Buffy. 

"An archaeologist in Colorado." Dawn frowned. "I thought his email address was a little weird, it's through the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, not the sort of place I'd expect to find an archaeologist, so I looked him up. He was generally considered to be a brilliant researcher, up until the 90s. Then he came up with a weird theory about the Egyptian pyramids being built by aliens, and pretty much got laughed out of the profession. A few years later he got hired by the Air Force for something or other, and pretty much disappeared. He hasn't published anything since." 

"Oh, yes!" said Giles. "I remember him now. He is quite brilliant, even if some of his theories are…outlandish. He uncovered quite a bit about the Gould demon infestation that took place in ancient Egypt, even if he did blame it on aliens." 

"Gold demons?" asked Xander. "Where can I find one?" 

"'Gould' not 'gold'," said Giles in an exasperated tone, "And you probably wouldn't like finding one at all. They are snake-like parasites that take over a human host, much the way a vampire does. A Gould infected host has many of a vampire's strengths, such as enhanced healing, longevity, and strength, and lack many of their weaknesses, such as an aversion to crosses, holy water, or sunlight. Some of them are very powerful magic users, rivaling even Willow's abilities. They are every bit as ruthless as a vampire: they think of themselves as gods, and therefore think that they can do anything they please." 

"If these things are so bad, how come we've never encountered any?" asked Buffy. 

"The Gould are extra-dimensional," said Giles. "They came to Earth through some sort of portal, and enslaved much of Egypt, taking on the personas of Egyptian gods. There was an uprising of their slaves, and most of Gould were driven back through their portal, and it was buried in the desert." 

"Still a few around, then?" asked Buffy. 

"Perhaps," said Giles, "but the Gould that remained were unable to reproduce. They can jump from host to host, but they can not make more of their kind. The theory is that there were only a few fertile queen Goulds with the vast majority being either infertile workers, or drones: like an ant colony, or a bee hive. Slayers have encountered and killed a few Goulds over the intervening millennia. The last was in 1734." 

"What's all this got to do with a temple in Latvia?" asked Buffy. 

"Hopefully nothing, but there were some references to something that may have been the Gould, in some of the inscriptions…I wonder if that was what drew Dr. Jackson's interest to it?" Giles didn't look happy. 

"What's the problem?" asked Xander. 

"As part of the coverup, I edited out all references to the Gould. Dr. Jackson may notice that." 

* * *

Daniel was going over his own notes, and Giles' interpretations of the Shetland temple inscriptions in his office. "This can't be right," he muttered to himself. 

Jack was sitting on the other side of Daniel's desk, with his boots up on it, idly turning one of Daniel's 'rocks' in his hands. He looked up. "What can't be right?" 

"This!" Daniel shoved the folder he had been reading from across his desk, and turned it around so Jack could read it. He pointed to a line in the text. "This is the third time that Giles mistranslated something in these inscriptions that referred to the Goa'uld." 

"So?" asked Jack. "It's not like he knows anything about them, is it?" 

"But he does," said Daniel. 

"_What?_" 

"Rupert Giles is an expert on ancient myths, from cultures all around the world, including Egypt," said Daniel. "He knows about myths of 'snake demons' who can possess human hosts, and control them. He has referenced them in some of his own writings, even calls them 'Gould.' In some of his letters on some of my published theories, he references them." 

"But he didn't recognise them here," said Jack. 

"Right," said Daniel. "The only thing I can figure is that he _deliberately_ mistranslated." 

"Why would he do that?" 

"That is a very good question," said Daniel. "If there is anything that can kill an academic reputation faster than theories about aliens, it's getting caught faking your results." 

"You said that the people who originally uncovered this temple were killed?" 

"Yes," said Daniel. "Their boat sank in a storm." 

"I'm thinking that was no boating accident," said Jack. "We need to have a talk with this Dr. Giles." 

Daniel's phone rang. He glanced at it. He saw the light flashing for the number that he had given to Dawn Summers. "Looks like this is our chance." He pointed to the earpiece that would let Jack listen in on the conversation. 

Daniel picked up the receiver of his phone "Dr. Jackson." 

"Ah, yes," said the voice on the other end. "This is Rupert Giles. You called me earlier?" 

"Yes, Dr. Giles," said Daniel. "It's about your work on the 1992 Shetlands dig." 

"I understand that you have found a similar temple," said Giles. "Can you tell me where it is?" 

"I'm afraid I can't," said Daniel. "I don't know exactly myself. I was brought in by some researchers in Latvia, and with the situation in Eastern Europe being the way it is, they are very secretive when it comes to the locations of such things." 

"I would very much like to see their find, first hand," said Giles. 

"I certainly understand that," said Daniel. "I'd like to see it too. I'd also like to see the Shetland site." 

"I wish that were possible," said Giles. "Unfortunately, it was lost." 

"You have no idea where it is?" asked Daniel. "There's nothing in your files that gives any indications? Perhaps some photographs that show some local landmarks that can be triangulated from?" 

"No," said Giles. "The photographs that survived are rather bereft of any sort of information that could be used to localize where they were taken. I know several people who have tried, and failed. Now, about the Latvia site: perhaps you could put me in touch with someone who _can_ tell me more about it?" 

The conversation went back and forth like that, with Daniel and Giles trying to pump each other for information about the locations of their respective finds, while revealing nothing themselves. They both gave up after a while, and the conversation turned to the translation of the 'Latvian' inscriptions. There they made some progress, with each of them talking animatedly about several possible interpretations. 

"One thing puzzles me, Dr. Giles," said Daniel. "I've been looking over your original work, and it seems to me that you mistranslated several references to what are clearly Gould demons. I would have thought that such references, far from Egypt, would have struck you as…unusual." 

There was silence on the phone for several seconds. "Oh dear lord," came Giles' voice eventually. "I can't believe I missed that!" His dismay almost sounded genuine to Daniel. They spent some time discussing what effect the addition of the Gould had on Giles' earlier translations, and in the end, came to the conclusion that it had none. Giles' earlier work hadn't identified the demons referenced as the same demons that had ruled ancient Egypt, but what little description of them that there was, was accurate. His not making the connection could be seen as an oversight…but Daniel didn't believe it. 

The conversation drew to a close. "Well, thank you for your help, Dr. Giles," said Daniel. "You've made several things clearer to me." 

"Happy to be of service," said Giles. "If there is anything else you need, feel free to call." 

"I'll do that," said Daniel. "Goodbye." 

"Goodbye, Dr. Jackson." 

Daniel hung up his phone, and looked at Jack. Jack had listened in on the entire conversation, even if his eyes had glazed over when they started getting into the nitty-gritty details of the translation. "What do you think?" 

"I think that Dr. Giles knows something he isn't telling us," said Jack. 

"You too, huh?" asked Daniel. "I wonder what it could be?" 

"I think it's time we found out," said Jack. He looked up at Sam and Teal'c as they came into Daniel's office. "You got 'em?" 

Sam waved a thick sheaf of photographs. "We got 'em." 

"What have you got?" asked Daniel. 

"Satellite photos of the Shetland Islands," said Sam. "Including some taken by the NRO's latest ground penetrating radar bird. If there's anything buried there, these will show it." 


	4. The Wrong Place

**Chapter 4: The Wrong Place**

Giles hung up his phone. A week had gone by since they had first heard from Dr. Jackson, and he'd had no luck. "No one I've contacted seems to know anything about any new discoveries in Latvia," he told Buffy. "That was an acquaintance in the archaeology department at the University of Riga. He knows nothing about any recent finds in Latvia, or anywhere else around the Baltic." 

"So, this Daniel Jackson guy lied about where he found those inscriptions," said Buffy. "Could he have uncovered the same temple that was found in 92?" 

"It doesn't seem likely," said Giles. "We left wards on the area that will encourage anyone who goes near it to…uh…look elsewhere." 

"Encourage how?" asked Buffy. 

"Nothing overt," said Giles. "They will just have a feeling that they are in the wrong place, and an urge to go someplace else. And if that doesn't work, there were also alarm spells left at the site, to notify us if it was disturbed." 

"'Us' being the old blown up Watchers' Council," said Buffy. "Who gets notified now?" 

"The alarm would have activated a crystal that was stored in the Council's vault, in the basement of the building," said Giles. "We managed to recover most of what was stored down there. I've spoken with Robson, to make sure that we did recover it. He tells me that the crystal is intact, and appears to be functioning." 

* * *

Jack watched the helicopter that had brought them to the island as it disappeared into the overcast sky. He slowly turned around, surveying the bleak landscape. Grey sky, grey ocean, grey rocks. Lots of grey, accented by brilliant green vegetation that hugged the ground. Nothing stood up to face the bitterly cold wind blowing in off the sea. He turned back to face the rest of SG-1, and the four man archaeological team that had come with them. "Let's get this stuff all moved to some place more sheltered to set up our camp." 

Major Carter consulted a hand-held GPS unit, and a topographic map of the island that had been created for them from the satellite images. She pointed downhill. "The temple is that way." She pointed out a flat stretch of land on her map, which would be sheltered from the wind by an outcrop of rock. "Here looks like a good place to make camp, Sir." 

"Okay campers!" called out Jack to the others. "Let's get moving! We don't have a lot of daylight left, and we don't want to be pitching tents in the dark!" 

Everyone shouldered their packs, and they picked up the cases of equipment that they had brought. Jack and Teal'c took the long case that had their weapons in it. They were supposed to be a civilian archaeological expedition, so they weren't openly carrying weapons. Even though the island appeared to be completely deserted, it did get some visitors from time to time. There was some sort of rare bird that nested here, and the island attracted bird watchers, but it was the wrong season for them, and the only place on the island where you could land a boat was four kilometers to the south. Everyone was dressed in mostly civilian clothes, and while much of their gear was clearly military in origin, it was the sort that could be picked up in an Army Surplus store, and was often used by people who spent long periods camping professionally. 

It took two trips to get everything moved to the camp site that Sam had picked out for them. They pitched their tents with the efficiency given by years of practice setting up camp on strange worlds, and they ate their evening meal of MREs at about the time that the invisible sun would be setting behind the clouds. 

Daniel and the other archaeologists didn't want to wait until morning before going to look at the temple site. It was only the discipline instilled in them from working for the SGC that made them wait until after their camp was set up, and they had eaten. They decided to take advantage of the long northern twilight to go have their first look at it. They set out after they had finished cleaning up after dinner. Jack and Teal'c went along—more out of a desire to get the lay of the land than any burning archaeological curiosity—while Sam stayed back at the camp to set up their communications equipment, and check in with the SGC. 

Their satellite images had shown the buried remains of the temple on a wind swept headland a couple of hundred meters from where they had made their camp. As they approached the site Teal'c could see clear evidence that an ancient structure had once stood there in the regular pattern of ridges and depressions in the ground. He couldn't understand why the site had gone undiscovered for so long. This island was remote, but it still got several visitors every year. Surely _someone_ would have taken an interest in the buried ruin. 

He also didn't understand why Daniel Jackson and the other scientists just walked right past the obvious ruins, and started to search a flat stretch of ground about fifty meters away from them. "Daniel Jackson, why are you looking here?" 

"This is where the satellite showed the ruins to be," said Daniel. 

Teal'c consulted his GPS unit. "The coordinates for the ruins shown in the images are over there." He pointed back the way they had come. 

Daniel barely glanced in the direction that Teal'c pointed. "That's not the right spot." 

"That is the position you marked on our maps," said Teal'c 

"It can't be," said Daniel. 

Colonel O'Neill came back from making a wide circle around the area. "Is there a problem?" 

"No problem," said Daniel. 

"Dr. Jackson and the others are looking in the wrong place," said Teal'c. 

Jack glanced around. "You sure? It all looks pretty much the same to me." 

Teal'c handed his GPS unit, and his map to Colonel O'Neill. "As you can see, we are fifty meters north of the position indicated on the map." 

Jack looked at the GPS, and the map. "He's right," he told Daniel. "You should be looking over there." He pointed south, but a strange look passed over his face. Despite the gathering darkness, Teal'c saw Colonel O'Neill's pupils contract. "That's not the right place." He shook his head. "This can't be right." He looked at the GPS unit again, and the map. "This clearly says that we are fifty meters north of where we should be." He looked back south. "But that's not the right place." 

"How do you know that is not the right place?" asked Teal'c. 

"I just know it," said Jack. 

Daniel took the map and the GPS unit. He examined them both carefully. He removed his own GPS unit from a pocket, and compared the position shown on it with the position given by Teal'c's. They agreed to three decimal places. "This is very strange. You're right…on the map we're in the wrong place, but when I look at it…" He looked back at the buried ruin. "That place feels _wrong._" 

Major Carter appeared out of the gloom. "Why's everyone over here?" she asked. "Shouldn't you all be over there?" she pointed to the ruin. 

"You think we belong over there?" asked Jack. 

"That's the place marked on the map, Sir," said Sam. 

"It doesn't feel _wrong_ to you?" asked Jack. 

"No Sir…should it?" 

"Perhaps there is some sort of field being emitted by an alien device, intended to keep people away," said Teal'c. "I am immune because I am Jaffa, and Major Carter is unaffected because of Jolinar." 

"That's possible," said Daniel. "But how are we supposed to excavate it if we can't get near it?" 

"You walked near the site on your way here," said Teal'c. "So you can clearly get near it." 

"You're right," said Daniel. He started to walk back the way they had come, but he started to veer to the side. 

"Stop, Daniel Jackson!" ordered Teal'c. "It is to your right." 

Daniel turned to the right, and started walking again. It took some more directions from Teal'c to get him to the right spot, but he was soon standing in the center of the buried ruin. He looked at the ground around him. 

"What do you see?" asked Jack. 

"Despite an almost overwhelming feeling that I shouldn't be here, I see clear signs that there is something here," said Daniel. "It has been buried for a long time…" He looked around some more. "Strange…" 

"What now?" asked Jack. 

"If this place was excavated by the British twelve years ago…there should still be some sign of it, but I don't see any. Maybe this _is_ the wrong place." 

"Even if this isn't the place the Brits found…I think we need to take a closer look at it," said Jack. "But it can wait until morning. It's getting too dark to start now." 


	5. Nobody Here But Us Tourists

**Chapter 5: Nobody Here But Us Tourists**

Giles' phone rang half way through breakfast. He washed down the bit of toast in his mouth with a swallow of orange juice as he went to answer it. "Rupert Giles. … Oh, good morning Robson. … Yes. …" A worried expression took over his face. "What time? … No, you were right to call me right away. … Yes. … Yes, we'll take care of that from here. … All right, thank you. Goodbye." 

He hung up the phone, and returned to the table, a frown on his face. "Willow, you need to arrange for air fare to get us to the Shetland Islands as quickly as possible." 

"What happened?" asked Buffy. 

"The alarm crystal was activated this morning," said Giles. "Someone has disturbed the temple there." 

"Tickets for how many?" asked Willow. She was already opening her portable computer. 

"Buffy, you, me…" Giles looked at Xander. 

"I'm in," said Xander. 

"Me too!" said Kennedy. 

"And me," said Dawn. 

"Dawn—" 

Dawn cut her sister off. "You're supposed to be showing me the world, remember? So far all I've seen of it is a bit of southern England." 

Buffy looked back at Giles. "Whatever killed those people twelve years ago is already dead, right?" 

"Assuming there was only one in the temple to be released…possibly," said Giles. "We never found any non-human bodies though." 

Buffy looked back at her sister. "Alright, you can come." 

"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" cried Dawn. 

"You might want to reconsider," said Giles. "The island is uninhabited. We are going to be roughing it." 

"Camping's fun!" said Dawn. 

Giles turned back to Kennedy. "We need to leave someone here, in charge of the other Slayers." 

Kennedy looked at Willow. "But I want to come with you!" 

"And I want you to come, baby," said Willow. 

"Giles is right." Buffy looked at Kennedy. "These girls have barely started their training. We can't leave them alone now." 

Kennedy looked disappointed, but she nodded her acquiescence. 

"So, tickets for five then," said Willow. "Where exactly are we going?" 

* * *

Dawn leaned over the railing of the fishing trawler, retching. "Next time," she told herself, "I'll let them leave me at home." She had spent most of the five hour boat trip at the railing, not that she had anything left in her stomach to throw up. She had mostly been dry heaving from ten minutes after they had left the harbour. She had also learned an important lesson: throw up over the _downwind_ side of the boat. She looked up at the growing island. "How much longer?" she asked a crewman. 

The man smiled kindly. If he was amused by her discomfort, he managed to keep it to himself…not something that could be said about everyone in the crew. "About an hour, miss. We have to land you on the southern side of the island. That's the only place you can get a boat ashore here." 

Dawn could believe that. All she could see were waves crashing against sharp rocks, or sheer cliff faces. It didn't look like there was any way to get onto that island. 

Buffy was standing nearby, with a pair of binoculars focused on the top of one of the cliffs. "There's someone up there," she said. "I can see two of them." 

* * *

Jack handed his binoculars to Teal'c. "Maybe they're just tourists." 

"Did not Daniel Jackson say that this is the wrong season for tourists?" 

"Maybe nobody told them that," said Jack. 

Teal'c examined the boat. He was not familiar with such craft, but he counted five people on the deck who seemed to be much more interested in looking at the island than in manning the ship. They also had clothing that set them apart from the others on the boat. One of them appeared to be a small, blonde woman, who was looking back at him through her own set of binoculars. "We have been seen." 

"So smile, and wave," said Jack, as he proceeded to do so. "We aren't doing anything suspicious here. We're just admiring the view." He saw the girl with the binoculars lower them, and wave back. 

They kept watching the boat as it sailed past the island, and then turned to the south, toward where there was a sheltered cove with a rocky beach that you could land a small boat on, if the weather conditions were favourable. 

Jack and Teal'c returned to their camp. Sam was off watching over the archaeological team. Without her or Teal'c supervising them, they tended to wander off, and start digging in other places. Daniel was in the tent that they had set up as a field lab. 

"I think that we're about to get some visitors," said Jack. 

"Really?" said Daniel. "That's unusual." 

"They might just be tourists, but I don't like the coincidence," said Jack. "Teal'c and I are going to go meet them. See if we can maybe encourage them to go someplace else." He opened up the long case containing their weapons, and pulled out an automatic pistol and a couple of clips for it. He checked, and loaded the gun before he slipped it under his jacket. 

Daniel pushed his glasses up his nose. "We are _way_ outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. Air Force here, Jack." 

"That's why I'm only going to 'encourage' them." Jack pulled out Teal'c's staff weapon, and handed it to him. 

Daniel raised his eyebrows. "That's a lot of encouragement." 

Teal'c's expression echoed Daniel's. "Indeed." 

"If they're just tourists, it'll look like a fancy walking stick to them, big guy," said Jack. "Now come on, we don't have much time to get to the landing." 

Jack and Teal'c passed Dr. Daryl Hawley on their way out of the tent. He ignored them, and went to the table that Daniel was working at. "You were right," he said. "The strata are all wrong for a natural deposit. Someone deliberately buried this place. From the looks of it, about ten years ago." 

"So this _is_ the temple that the British team found," said Daniel. "And someone deliberately hid it, again." 

* * *

Xander pushed the zodiac that had been used to land them away from the beach, and waved goodbye to the man at it's helm. "See you in a week!" he called. 

The man at the helm just waved, as he slowly backed the boat away. He shifted into forward gear, and advanced the throttle as he turned the boat away from the shore and headed back out into the deeper water where the trawler was waiting for him. 

Dawn was gulping down a bottle of water. "How you feeling Dawnie?" asked Buffy. 

"Better." Dawn lowered the bottle and looked around. "The world is still swaying a bit, but it's better." They seemed to be surrounded by sheer cliffs on three sides, and the ocean on the fourth. "So how do we get out of here?" 

Giles pointed down the beach. "There's a path over that way, that we can climb up. Everyone grab your pack." 

Dawn stowed her half full water bottle, and lifted her pack onto her shoulders. Giles and Xander inspected the others' straps before Giles started to lead them down the beach toward the cliffs. They kept looking just as sheer, and unclimbable to Dawn until Giles suddenly disappeared around a rocky outcrop. When Dawn came around it she saw a narrow path leading up through a steep ravine cut through the cliff. 

* * *

Jack saw the people climbing up through the ravine before they saw him. His first impression was 'tourists.' All except for the man in the lead looked like kids to him. The dark haired girl in the middle especially looked like she was still a teenager. Most of them seemed to be labouring under the loads of their packs, but there was something about the way the blonde girl moved. She seemed to be moving effortlessly, despite the heavy look of her pack. He looked for weapons, and didn't see anything aside from the knives that some of them were wearing in sheaths on their belts. Not that unusual a thing for people on a camping trip to carry. There was a curious shaped…something…strapped to the blonde's pack. It was enclosed in a case so he couldn't see it, but it was a little over a meter long. It might have been an axe of some sort, but he couldn't think of why someone would put an axe in a case like that, and the closest thing this island had to a tree was some low scrub. 

The blonde picked that moment to look up, and her eyes met his. She stopped suddenly, which made the girl behind her almost run into her. 

"Howdy!" called Jack. 

They all stopped at the sound of his voice, and looked up toward him and Teal'c. "Oh, ah, hello," said the man in a breathless English accent. Jack thought that he had heard the voice somewhere before. 

Jack had a good look at them while he waited for them to climb the last few meters up to him and Teal'c. Most of them were looking pretty tired from their climb…again the exception was the blonde: she wasn't even breathing hard, and that made him wonder. Even the fittest of the SG team members would be looking a little tired after making that climb with packs on their backs. The other four all looked about like what he would expect civilians who were in better than average shape to look. 

They all came up out of the ravine. The man in the lead was maybe approaching fifty. He was followed by the short blonde. Once she got up onto the flat land, Jack saw that she was even shorter than he had thought at first. The second girl was quite a bit taller, with long dark hair, and she looked to be the youngest of them. The third girl, with shoulder length red hair looked to be in her early twenties, like the blonde. The last of them was a young, dark haired man, about the same age as the older girls, with a patch over his left eye. 

As soon as they were on the flat ground, they all removed their packs, and most of them found something to sit on while they caught their breaths. 

"So, what brings you folks to this island paradise?" asked Jack. "You've missed the bird watching season." 

"What?" asked the older man. "Oh…um…archaeology, actually. I've heard that there are some interesting ruins here, that my students and I want to have a look at." 

'Ah shit!' thought Jack, but he hoped he kept his reaction off his face. "Ruins?" 

"Yes," said the man. "Up at the northern end of the island. Near where we saw you from the boat." 

Jack knew it was pointless to try to deny it. "Yep, that was us." 

"So, you're archaeologists?" asked the man. 

"Who, us?" asked Jack. "No, we just came along to help carry stuff." He stuck out his hand. "Jack O'Neill." He nodded toward Teal'c. "And this is Murray." 

The man shook his hand. "Rupert Giles." 

'Aw _shit!_' thought Jack again. He'd thought the voice was familiar. He almost didn't catch the first name, as Rupert started to introduce the others. The blonde was named Buffy. 'What sort of parent would name their kid Buffy?' he asked himself, as Rupert introduced the others. 

"So, you're all archaeology students?" asked Jack. 

"Nyah," said the one named Xander. (Did none of these people have normal names?) "They just brought me along to help carry stuff." 

* * *

Buffy watched the two men who had met them at the top of the cliff carefully. They seemed friendly enough…at least Jack did. The large black man, Murray, still hadn't said anything, and he kept his face expressionless, but his eyes were alert, like he was always on guard. He was wearing a hat that was pulled down over his forehead, almost like he was trying to hide something. There was an ornate staff of some sort, that he was holding as if it were some sort of walking stick, but something about the way he held it said 'weapon' to her. She was feeling something else from him too: something not human. Jack on the other hand felt perfectly normal to her. She thought he looked pretty good—for an old guy. He obviously kept himself in shape. He and Murray had just hiked a few miles over rough ground in a little over an hour, and neither of them looked the least bit tired. She looked around at the others. Dawn was just finishing off her water bottle, and Xander, Willow and Giles were looking like they were ready to start moving again. She picked up her pack and swung it onto her shoulders. "So, was Giles right?" she asked Jack. "Are there interesting ruins here?" 

"Oh yes," said Jack. "In fact an acquaintance of his is leading the dig. A Dr. Daniel Jackson." 

"Oh, he's here?" asked Dawn. "I wanted to meet him. He sounded cute on the phone." 

Jack smiled at Dawn. "I'll have to tell him you think so." 

Dawn looked mortified. "Oh, don't! Please don't!" 

"So, Dr. Jackson is here," said Giles. "I wonder how he found this site?" 

"I was wondering the same about you, Dr. Giles," said Jack. "Daniel gave me the impression that you told him you had no idea where this is." 

"Yes…well…I'm afraid I've been trying to keep this place my little secret, until I could get the funding to properly excavate it," said Giles. 

"Well, since we are all here now," said Jack. "We might as well combine our efforts, don't you think?" 

"Yes, yes, of course!" said Giles. "Capital idea." 

Jack pulled a small radio out of his pocket. "I'll just call our base camp, let them know we're coming." He lifted it to his mouth. "Hello, Danny, you read me?" He waited for a response that didn't come. "Sam, are you there?" Buffy's eyes narrowed. She could see that he wasn't pushing the button properly for his radio to transmit. 

"I guess something's blocking the signal," said Jack. He pointed to a rise of land. "I'll try from up there." He jogged away up the hill. Buffy glanced at Murray, and saw his calm eyes looking back at her. She felt like he was guarding them, to make sure they didn't wander off. 

* * *

Jack lifted his radio again when he got far enough away to be sure that he couldn't be overheard. "Daniel, you read me?" 

"I read you Jack," crackled Daniel's voice. "So what's with our visitors?" 

"One of them is your Dr. Rupert Giles," said Jack. "He says that the others are his 'students.'" 

"Dr. Giles has never been a teacher," said Daniel. 

"Why am I not surprised?" asked Jack. "I want you to phone home and ask them to get you everything they can on four people: Buffy Summers, Dawn Summers, Willow Rosenberg and Xander Harris." 

"Oh, I talked to a Dawn Summers, when I first tried to contact Dr. Giles." 

"I know," said Jack. "She said you sounded cute on the phone." 

"You told them I was here?" 

"It seemed pretty pointless to deny it, since there really isn't anything we can do to chase them away, now is there?" said Jack. "So I invited them to come join us." 

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" asked Daniel. 

"You know what they say: 'keep you friends close, and your enemies closer.'" 

"So, which are they?" 

"Don't know yet," said Jack. "But either way, I want them where I can keep an eye on them." 

"I guess you're right," said Daniel. 

"Okay," said Jack. "I figure it's going to take us a couple of hours to get back, with these kids along. When we get there I want everyone to remember that we are all supposed to be civilians. We all call each other by our names, no ranks, and Teal'c's name is Murray." 


	6. A Cross Country Hike

**Chapter 6: A Cross Country Hike**

Jack O'Neill set a brisk pace as they trekked across the island. Buffy watched the way he moved. He just seemed to be sauntering along, like he didn't have a care in the world, and he wasn't in any particular hurry to get anywhere, but his long strides ate up the distance. It reminded her of the way Riley had moved sometimes when they were out on patrol together. She glanced back toward Murray, who was bringing up the rear of their column. He was much less relaxed looking. His gait was closer to a march, and he still looked like he thought he was guarding them. He hadn't spoken yet, and she was starting to wonder if he was mute or something. 

She dropped back a bit, and fell in beside Willow. "So, are you sensing anything from Murray? I'm getting a weird vibe off him." 

"Demon?" asked Willow quietly. 

Buffy shook her head. "Don't know. Just…not of the norm. Maybe it's the way he just doesn't talk." 

"He definitely seems to be the strong silent type," said Willow. She closed her eyes for a moment. "I'm not feeling any sort of magic from him. If he's a demon, it's not one with any sort of magical power…or it's very good at shielding." 

"How about Jack?" asked Buffy. 

"No magic," said Willow. "Nothing demony…but he's carrying a gun." 

"Yeah," said Buffy. "I noticed that." 

* * *

Jack was watching Buffy. Every time he glanced back, as if to make sure everyone was keeping up, he looked at her. He could see that she was curious about Teal'c. He'd have to talk to the big guy, give him some pointers on the fine art of making small talk. His silent routine sometimes roused suspicions. He was also pondering the pack that Buffy was carrying. You could judge the weight of a pack from the way a person carried it. It didn't matter how strong they were, a heavy pack affected the balance of the person under it: how they leaned to keep their center of gravity over their feet. Buffy's pack must weigh at least as much as she did—maybe more, she couldn't weigh all that much—but she carried it so effortlessly it seemed like it was full of nothing but air. The others were looking about how he expected them to: Dawn and Xander were easily keeping up with the pace he was setting, Willow and Rupert were starting to look like they could use a break. He remembered a good place to stop a few hundred meters up ahead. He turned back to tell them, and saw that Buffy was having some sort of quiet conversation with Willow. He wished he could hear what they were saying. 

"We're going to be crossing a stream, just a little way up ahead," he said loudly, to make sure everyone heard him. "It'll be a good place to take a break." 

* * *

Willow was the first to drop to the ground when they reached the stream. "Oh, thank the goddess! I was just about ready to drop!" 

"Goddess?" asked Teal'c. 

"Hey!" said Dawn. "He speaks!" 

"Willow's a Wiccan," said Buffy. "Big into the Earth-Mother-Goddess thing." 

"A Wiccan named Rosenberg?" asked Jack. 

"You have a problem with Jewish Wiccans, buster?" asked Willow. 

Jack saw something flash in her eyes…a look that said it might not be a good idea to piss this girl off. "No…no problem." 

Dawn was looking at the crystal clear water of the stream. "Would it be okay to refill my bottle here?" 

"Sure, Dawn," said Xander. "But don't forget to add one of the purification tablets." He took a sip from his own bottle, which was still half full. He also pulled some sort of energy bar out of a pocket, took a bite from it, and used more water to wash it down. 

"We were beginning to think you might be a mute, or something," Buffy said to Teal'c. 

"No," said Teal'c, "I do not believe in talking unless I have something I wish to say." 

"So, Murray, where are you guys from?" asked Xander. 

"I am from Chulak," said Teal'c. 

"Chulak?" asked Buffy. "Never heard of it." 

"It's a small town in Colorado," said Jack. 

"Oh yeah?" asked Dawn. "Is it near Colorado Springs?" 

"Why do you think that?" asked Jack. 

"Dr. Jackson's email address was through the Air Force Academy," said Dawn. "And I read something about him working for them." 

This girl was entirely too bright for Jack's liking. "I understand that he's done some consulting for the Air Force, but we're working for the University of Colorado." They had papers that said so, and everything. All the proper permits for performing an archaeological dig here. Someone in the British government would be very surprised to learn that the permits that had been issued to them really _were_ being used for a dig, and not as a cover for some sort of top secret NATO operation, though Jack had to wonder what sort of op they thought could be held in this god forsaken place. 

He watched Dawn finish filling her water bottle, and then drop in a tablet from a bottle she took from her pocket. He saw that it was a commercial version of the same sort of tablets the SGC used. She shook her bottle to dissolve the tablet, and then started to raise it to her mouth. "You might want to wait a few minutes," he said. 

Dawn lowered the bottle again. "Huh?" 

"It takes a few minutes to be sure that those things have killed anything that was in the water," said Jack. He regretted that he had given her the advice for a moment—if she got sick, they might leave—but then he felt guilty about wishing that on the girl. 

Dawn looked embarrassed. "Oh, thanks. So, where are you from?" 

"Minnesota," said Jack. 

"Oh yeah? I hear it's nice." 

"What about you guys?" asked Jack. "Where are you from?" 

"Westbury," said Dawn. "It's near Bath." 

"But you're Americans," he glanced at Giles. "Well, most of you." 

"Oh, our home town doesn't exist anymore," said Dawn. 

"Really? What happened to it?" 

"It fell into a giant sink hole. Sunnydale, California. It made all the news shows." Dawn couldn't help smiling. For some reason she found the sink hole explanation for the destruction of Sunnydale to be funny. Her smile quickly vanished as she remembered the people who had died that day though. 

'Ah _shit!_ _Shit!_ _Shit!_' thought Jack. He should have read Giles' file for himself. Why hadn't Daniel mentioned Sunnydale? This was entirely too much of a coincidence. The SGC had gone onto high alert after what had happened there. SG-1 had been just about to ship out to investigate it—to see if there was any sort of alien involvement, maybe some new form of Goa'uld attack—when they had gotten the phone call from the Pentagon telling them they could stand down. The phone call had come from Major Davis, he remembered. The same man who had called Daniel as soon as he had taken an interest in Rupert Giles. _Why_ hadn't Daniel told him about Sunnydale? 

Jack turned his attention back to Dawn, afraid that she had noticed that he had reacted badly to what she had said, but she seemed to be lost in her own thoughts. "Something wrong?" 

"Hmm…no…it's just that… Some of my friends died in Sunnydale. It's okay." 

Jack recognised the look in her eyes. It was a look he'd seen in the eyes of a lot of soldiers who had lost comrades in battle. He hated seeing it in a girl who couldn't be eighteen yet. "I've lost friends too. It's never 'okay.'" 

Dawn nodded her understanding. Jack watched her for a moment, and saw that she would probably like to be alone for a moment. He turned his attention back to the others. Willow had her boots off, and was rubbing her feet. "Are you okay?" he asked. 

"Fine," said Willow. "I just should have broken in my boots better before I tried walking a few miles in them." 

"You getting blisters?" asked Xander. 

"No…just sore feet, but thanks for asking." 

"It's important to look after your feet," said Xander. "Never know when you might need them to run away from something." 

"You expect there to be anything on this island to run away from?" asked Jack. 

"You never know," said Xander. "We might run into a pack of rabid penguins." 

"Xander, the only penguins you are going to find within thousands of miles of here, are in a zoo," said Giles. 

"How about rabid ducks?" asked Xander. "Could there be ducks?" 

"Not with rabies," said Willow. "Birds don't get rabies." 

"And there's no rabies in the British Isles anyway," added Dawn. 

"And I think that we've had enough rest, if you feel up to having discussions about rabid ducks," said Giles. 


	7. Introductions

**Chapter 7: Introductions**

They came over a rise, and saw the small cluster of tents below them. There didn't seem to be anyone around them. All the activity was a couple of hundred yards away, where they could see several people working in and around a shallow trench that had been dug in the ground. 

Buffy felt a surge of relief. They were digging in the wrong place. She didn't know how she knew that, but she did. Then she remembered what Giles had told them about the spell that had been cast over the temple to keep it from being rediscovered. She moved back up beside Willow. "Will, is the keep away spell still active?" 

"Yeah," said Willow quietly. "I can feel it." 

"And I've got this strong feeling that they're in the wrong place," said Buffy. "Does that mean that they're in the right place?" 

"Yeah, it does." 

"So, why isn't the spell working on them?" 

"Don't know." 

Jack pointed to a place about twenty yards from where his tents were set up. "Why don't you folks set up your camp over there?" 

Buffy looked at the place he had picked out for them. "Yeah, that looks good." It was close enough that they'd be able to keep an eye on Jack and his people, and far enough away to give them a little privacy. She wondered if Jack was thinking pretty much the same thing when he had selected it. She walked down the hill and dropped her pack where he had indicated, and the others quickly followed suit. 

"Can we take a look at your dig now?" asked Giles. 

"Why don't you rest for a bit, and get your camp set up first," said Jack. "I'll make sure that the kids are ready for visitors. Murray, why don't you go spell Carter for a bit, and ask her to come up here?" 

"Very well, O'Neill." Murray nodded and walked quickly away toward the dig. 

Buffy and the others started to unpack their gear, and pitch their tents. Jack noted that they didn't seem to have had much practice at this sort of thing, and wasted a lot of time getting in each other's way. They weren't anywhere near done when Major Carter joined them. Jack introduced her around, and she shook everyone's hands. 

She turned back to Jack after she was done. "A message came in from Hammond while you were out, Jack. I think you'll want to see it." 

"Right!" said Jack, "I should do that! You folks keep…" He waved his hand around the vicinity of their camp site. "…doing what you're doing." He and Sam started back toward their tents. 

"So, you feel anything?" he asked Sam quietly. 

"No Sir," said Sam. "Should I have?" 

"That girl, Buffy, she's a lot stronger than she looks. I figure her pack must have weighed at least a fifty kilos." 

Sam looked back in surprise. "Really? She doesn't look like she could carry a ten kilo pack that far." 

"I know," said Jack. "I was wondering if maybe she was a Goa'uld." 

"I didn't feel anything like that from her, or any of the others. Teal'c should have told you if he felt anything." 

"Just getting a second opinion." 

"Anything unusual about the others?" 

"Nope. They act pretty much like I'd expect them to act, if they were really who they say they are, except that they seem to be as suspicious of us as we are of them. So, did the folks back home find out anything about them?" 

"Yes, Sir." Sam lifted the flap of the lab tent. "Quite a bit." 

Sam had printed out copies of the files that they had been sent for Jack to read. He scanned over them all quickly, not really noticing anything that jumped out at him, except that none of them was a student of archaeology. Buffy had a rather impressive police record: lots of "suspicion" of one thing or another, right up to murder, but nothing that had gone as far as actual charges being filed. Their files showed that they had all moved to England together after the destruction of Sunnydale, and didn't show much since then. 

Sam handed him another piece of paper. "We also received this, Sir." 

  
_Jack:_

_High level sources have informed me that there are some important omissions in these files, but they are unable to tell me what has been omitted. They are confident that Rupert Giles and his people are not a threat, but they are unwilling to reveal any specifics._

_Use your best judgement when dealing with these people._

_G. Hammond._  
  


"What that heck does that mean?" asked Jack. 

"I guess it means that he trusts your judgement, Sir." 

Jack frowned. "This message is almost worse than him not telling me anything. Who are his sources, and why give him non-information like that, if they couldn't say anything useful? This almost sounds like NID crap!" 

"I'm sure you'll work it out, Sir." 

"And stop calling me 'Sir'!" said Jack. "Our guests are supposed to think we're a bunch of archaeologists." 

"Yes, S— Jack." 

"See? I knew you could do it!" 

Jack saw that their visitors had a pair of civilian looking tents set up when he and Sam got back outside. Both of them looked to be big enough to sleep four, and they seemed to be dividing their gear between the two of them, Giles and Xander into one, and the girls into the other. 

Buffy saw him and Sam approaching. "So, can we see the dig now?" she asked. 

"Sam, why don't you show our guests the dig?" 

"Okay, Jack." Sam waved toward where they could see the people working. "If you'll come with me." She started to walk toward the dig. 

Jack hung back a bit, watching as the new arrivals followed Sam. He followed a few meters behind, wanting to see their reaction to the 'Wrong Place' field. They reacted pretty much the way everyone but Teal'c and Sam was reacting to it now. They looked a little confused, like they thought they should be somewhere else, but they managed to stay with Sam, and not wander off. Jack thought about that for a bit. It had taken most of them a day to get to the point where they could manage that. Now, when they concentrated, most of their group could get themselves to the site without any help from Sam or Teal'c. He supposed it could be because they could clearly see where the archaeologists were working now, but he didn't think that was the explanation. Giles had indicated that he'd been here before. Maybe that was why he could do it…but then how had he found it the _first_ time? 

* * *

Buffy followed along after Sam Carter, all the time feeling that she was going in the wrong direction. If Giles hadn't told her about the spell placed on this location, and she couldn't _see_ the people working up ahead, she might not have been able to follow Carter at all, which raised the question in her mind:'How is Carter doing this?' 

A man separated himself from the others at the dig, and came toward them. Buffy recognised him from the pictures she'd seen of him, and decided that the photos didn't do him justice. He was cute…in a way that Giles might have been ten years ago, and she _so_ didn't want to think thoughts like that. 

He approached Giles, and held out his hand. "Dr. Giles, a pleasure to meet you. I'm Daniel Jackson." 

Giles shook his hand. "Happy to meet you too, at last. I have a great deal of respect for your work." 

"Then you are a member of a very small minority," said Daniel. 

"Yes, well, many people have a great deal of difficulty in accepting anything outside of their day to day experience." 

"So, do you think the pyramids were built by little green men from outer space?" asked Sam. 

"Well…ah…I'd have to say 'no' to that," said Giles. "But Dr. Jackson's evidence that they are much older than the accepted theory is very persuasive." 

Giles introduced Daniel to Buffy, Dawn, Willow and Xander, and he in turn introduced them to his team of archaeologists: Dr. Daryl Hawley, Jerry Morrison, Doug Ritchie and Charles Delaney, and then he showed them the dig. It looked like a trench to Buffy. One that was being dug very slowly. 

The biggest tool she could see anyone using looked like a garden trowel. She only half listened as Giles and Dr. Jackson got into a discussion about what they were doing, how they had chosen this particular location for their first exploratory trench, and other boring things. She watched the people work instead. She was particularly interested in Murray. He didn't seem to actually be doing any of the digging. He had a chart of the area, showing where the trench was supposed to go, and he used it to direct where the others were working. She saw him call one of the others back after they started to wander off. Buffy found herself wandering off a couple of times herself, but Murray didn't call her back. She had to find her way back on her own, after she noticed that she wasn't near the dig anymore. She found it was easier to stay on the site if she concentrated on the people. As long as she was thinking about them, and not the dig, the feeling that she was in the wrong place faded into the background. 

Buffy noticed that Dawn didn't seem to be having much trouble keeping from wandering off. She was staying close to Dr. Jackson. Buffy could see the early warning signs of a developing crush. She really hoped he wouldn't turn out to be evil. 

Giles volunteered his own services, and those of the others to aide in the digging, but Dr. Jackson politely declined, saying that he had more than enough people working now. Any more would just start getting in each other's way. 

It was already late afternoon, and Jack arrived at the dig to tell everyone it was time to take a break for dinner. He invited Buffy and Giles and the others to join them. "That is, unless you've got something better than MREs to eat." 

"MREs?" asked Buffy. 

"Meal Ready to Eat," said Xander. "Military rations." 

"Yeah," said Jack. "Picked them up surplus. Great for extended camping trips." 

"We've got dehydrated camping rations," said Xander. "Maybe we can trade, give ourselves a little variety." 

"How much have you got?" asked Jack. 

"Enough for two weeks," said Xander. 

"You planning to be here that long?" Buffy could tell that Jack really didn't like that idea. 

"No," said Xander. "The boat's supposed to come back for us in a week, but we didn't want to be caught short if they can't pick us up because of weather, or something like that." 

Jack obviously didn't like the idea of them being there a week much better than he did two weeks. 

It was a fairly tense meal, eaten at Jack's camp site. Both groups were suspicious of the other, and neither was being very subtle about it. Buffy was tempted to just demand outright who these people really were, and what they were doing here, but she didn't want to have to face the same sort of questioning herself, so she went on pretending to believe that these people were just a bunch of archaeologists from Colorado. 

None of the archaeologists wanted to talk about what they were doing here, so Giles tried to turn the discussion to what their previous work had been. He found that they were just as reluctant to talk about any of their more recent work, but quite willing to talk about ancient ruins in general. Buffy found herself tuning them out. Giles might be able to talk for hours about civilisations that had vanished thousands of years ago, but she couldn't. 

She turned her attention to the others around the table. Jack seemed to be just as bored with the archaeology talk as she was. He tried to talk about hockey with Xander, and seemed surprised to learn that Xander knew almost nothing about the game. Sam Carter was taking an interest in the archaeology talk, but her questions and comments pegged her as someone who, though she had an interest in the field, wasn't one of the professionals. She reminded Buffy of Willow: someone with a very sharp mind, who took an interest in everything. Murray was being…Murray. Sitting quietly, observing everything around him. 

"So, if Jack and Murray are here to carry stuff, what's your job?" Buffy asked Sam. 

"Oh, um, technical support," said Sam. "The communications equipment, the computers, stuff like that." 

"I noticed your satellite dish," said Xander. "Pick up any good TV stations?" 

"It's not for TV," said Sam. "It's for voice and telecommunications." 

"Do you have Internet access?" asked Willow. 

"Yes, but it's pretty limited bandwidth," said Sam. Actually it was a very high bandwidth connection. She just didn't want to tell Willow that. 

Dawn started to pepper Daniel with questions about his theories on the Egyptian pyramids, and Buffy noticed that though he wasn't nearly as evasive in his answers to her questions about them, he seemed to be almost as reluctant to talk about that subject as he was about his current work. He seemed to be thinking over his answers carefully before he said anything, and once or twice he seemed to start to say something, but then censored himself. Jack also started to take more interest in what they were talking about. He didn't say anything, but Buffy could tell that he was monitoring the conversation. 

They returned to their own camp site after dinner. Buffy glanced back over her shoulder to make sure that they weren't being followed. "Dawn, I want you to see if you can learn anything more about these guys." 

"Okay, I'll hit the Internet. Thank god for magic WiFi." 

"Willow, can you do anything to make us immune to the keep away spell, while still keeping it in place?" 

"Maybe," said Willow. "It doesn't seem to be affecting Sam or Murray, so there should be some way to duplicate that effect…but I've got no idea why they're immune." 

"How long will it take?" 

"Don't know," said Willow. 

"If you can't come up with something by the morning, I think you should just drop the whole spell, like we planned." 

"Are you sure that's wise?" asked Giles. "They are bound to notice." 

"I think we should risk it," said Buffy. "I don't like the idea that I might go running off in the wrong direction if something happens, and I need to get there in a hurry. Willow, are you feeling any magic from any of them?" 

"Not really," said Willow. "I tried reading their auras…but I'm not really all that good at that. Daniel has a very bright one, I think he's got a lot of potential, but it's…disorganised. I don't think he knows how to use it. Murray's aura was…strange…like he has something else inside him." 

"Possession?" asked Buffy. 

"No…I don't think so. Whatever it is doesn't seem to be conscious. There's something else about him though. A bit of a discontinuity happens whenever anyone calls him 'Murray.' I don't think that's his real name." 

"Why would they lie about his name?" asked Xander. 

"Maybe he's famous," said Dawn. "He's always wearing that hat, like he's trying to hide." 

"Or his real name is something really weird," said Xander. 

"Weirder than 'Xander'?" asked Buffy. 

"What's the matter with 'Xander,' _Buffy?_" 

Buffy decided to ignore the question. "Anything else about them?" 

"An awful lot of their gear is military," said Xander. 

"You think they're Army?" asked Buffy. "Initiative?" 

"I don't know," said Xander. "If they were, they'd know who we are, wouldn't they? I got the impression that they're trying to figure us out just as hard as we're trying to figure them out." 

"Maybe I should try to contact Riley," said Dawn. "See if he can learn anything about them." 

* * *

Jack watched the visitors all disappear into their tents. "So, what do ya think?" 

"They seem to be pretty much what their files say they are," said Sam. 

"Dawn Summers is a bit of a surprise," said Daniel. "Nothing in her file indicates that she should have nearly as much knowledge of ancient cultures as she seems to. Most of her grades for the last couple of years were pretty…dismal." 

"But her I.Q. test scores are pretty good," said Sam. "Almost as smart as Willow Rosenberg, and she's had a pretty tough last few years. She and her sister have been living with Dr. Giles for nearly a year now, and they've known him much longer. She might have learned a lot from him." 

"She seems like a nice kid," said Jack, "which really makes me wonder: if they are up to something, why bring her along?" 


	8. Getting to Know You

**Chapter 8: Getting to Know You**

Dawn poured herself a cup of coffee from the pot sitting on their camp stove, and went back to sit with the others who were eating their cold breakfasts in front of their tents. She held the mug in both hands to warm her fingers while she sat back down in her folding camp chair. "Okay, I managed to find a little something on some of these guys. It seems that they are military, but they aren't Army, they're Air Force. Colonel Jack O'Neill, and Major Samantha Carter are anyway. I managed to find them both listed as Air Force Academy alumni. They are currently assigned to a deep space radar telemetry project based in the NORAD complex under Cheyenne Mountain. I think that digging any deeper on them is going to require some Willow magic." 

"Doesn't look like they're doing any deep space telemetry here," said Xander. 

"Doesn't really make any sense for Colonel O'Neill to be assigned to a project like that, either," said Dawn. "He's Special Forces." 

"And Carter?" asked Buffy. 

"Her being involved in space radar makes a little more sense," said Dawn. "She's got a doctorate in astrophysics from Stanford. Had some papers published in theoretical physics: wormholes and stuff like that, but she hasn't published lately either. Doesn't explain why she's here though, or what they're doing with Dr. Jackson and the rest. A Special Forces colonel, an astrophysicist, and an archaeologist don't really go together." 

"Sounds like the setup for a joke," said Xander. "A colonel, an astrophysicist and an archaeologist walk into a bar together…" 

Buffy ignored Xander. "Have you heard back from Riley or Sam yet?" 

"Nope. I have no idea where in the world they may be, or what they're doing. They may not be able to read their email right now." 

"Anything on the others?" 

"Dr. Daryl Hawley is a respected archaeologist, who took a leave of absence from Columbia University a couple of years ago, to conduct some 'private research'," said Dawn. "I couldn't find out much of anything about the others." 

"And Murray?" asked Xander. 

"Zilch, but just a first name isn't much to go on…if it's his first name, could be his last, if it's really his name at all. There is no town named 'Chulak' anywhere in Colorado…or anywhere else for that matter." 

"You get anywhere with the keep away spell, Will?" 

Willow reached into her jacket pocket, and pulled out four cloth pouches on leather thongs. She handed them out to the others. "Here, put these around your necks, and you should be fine." 

Buffy put hers around her neck, and slipped the pouch down inside her jacket so it wouldn't show. "No idea why it doesn't seem to work on Murray, or Carter?" 

"Nope. I've tried a couple of castings to see if I can get any sort of reading on them, to see why they're different, but so far, nada. Any more would require doing something they'd notice." 

"Can you drop the spell slowly?" asked Buffy, "Since it doesn't really seem to be doing much good. Have it fade away, so it seems to them like they're just picking up some immunity from exposure, or something like that?" 

"Yeah, I can do that," said Willow. "How long should it take?" 

"I think twenty-four hours will be good enough…have it gone by this time tomorrow." 

"Consider it done," said Willow. 

"What are we going to do next?" asked Xander. 

"I think that we should each take one of them, and keep an eye on them," said Buffy. 

"Dibs on Dr. Jackson!" said Dawn. 

Buffy frowned at her. "Dawn, we don't know what these guys are up to. Don't go getting yourself attached." 

"I'm not," said Dawn, but she didn't sound very convincing. "I mean, he's the linguist, right? And I'm good with languages. It makes sense that I keep tabs on him." 

"Alright," said Buffy. "And Willow can speak astrophysicist, so she'll take Carter. I think I want to keep an eye on Jack. Xander…" 

"I'll take Murray. See if I can get him talking." 

"Right," said Buffy. "Which leaves Giles to get chummy with Dr. Hawley, and the rest of the archaeologists." 

* * *

The groups from the two camps met about half way to the dig. Giles rubbed an apparently stiff neck. "I'm getting too old for sleeping on the ground." 

"Jack keeps saying the same thing," said Daniel. 

"So, you guys do a lot of camping?" asked Dawn. 

Daniel pushed his glasses up his nose. "He's, uh, he's been with me on quite a few expeditions to out of the way places." 

"I didn't think you'd been doing much field work lately." 

"Ah, well…mostly we've been visiting other…countries," said Daniel. "Observing their cultures, and such. Quite often the conditions are rather primitive." 

"So, Dr. Jackson, we never really got the chance last night to discuss how much progress you have made here," said Giles. 

"Yes, well, we're just beginning our preliminary survey. We have uncovered a couple of interesting items, but so far our most significant find seems to be that this site was deliberately buried, a few years ago." Daniel watched Giles carefully to see how he would react to that news. 

Giles took a handkerchief from his pocket, and removed his glasses. He looked around, while he cleaned them. "Really? Why would someone do something like that?" 

"We've been wondering that ourselves, Dr. Giles." 

* * *

"No! No! No!" said Xander. "Greedo did _not_ shoot first!" 

"I have seen this movie several times, Xander Harris, and Greedo clearly shoots first, and misses." 

"That's the Special Edition," said Xander. "In the _real_ Star Wars Han just blasts Greedo before he can pull the trigger." 

Murray stood for a second, considering. "That would make more sense. A warrior, such as Han Solo would not let his adversary take the first shot, and it would be impossible for Greedo to miss at such short range, with his weapon already drawn, and aimed." 

"Exactly!" said Xander. "And with all the money they spent putting in a pointless CGI Jabba, they couldn't spare a couple of bucks to fix Obiwan's light saber?" 

Dawn shook her head at them as they passed. At least Xander had found something to talk with Murray about. She wondered for a second if they shouldn't have brought Andrew along before she shoved that thought aside, and ducked under the flap into the lab tent. She saw Daniel sitting at a table, with his back to the entrance. He was intently studying the image on the laptop screen in front of him. Dawn walked up behind him, and looked at it over his shoulder. He didn't seem to notice she was there. He was looking at an enhanced image of some carvings that had been uncovered that morning. 

"'And they shall rise up from under the ground, and devour all in their path,'" she read. She shuddered a bit. It reminded her of the 'from beneath you it devours' warnings they'd had about the First. 

Daniel started, and looked around. "Oh! Dawn!" He looked at his computer screen, and then back at her. "You can read that?" 

Dawn looked embarrassed. "Uh…yeah. I read Giles' paper, and his notes before we came here." 

"But still," said Daniel. "Even with that as a base…I've spent an hour on this!" 

"Uh…Giles says I have a real gift with languages," said Dawn. "I'm really good at picking them up…at least to read. I'm less good at speaking them." 

"We aren't likely to run into anyone who speaks this language," said Daniel. "I don't think anyone has for a couple of thousand years. Still, that is quite a remarkable talent. It could take you far." 

"So far, it's taken me to England," said Dawn. "Giles pulled some strings with some old friends. I'm starting in the linguistics program at Oxford in the fall." 

Daniel brought up another image on his laptop screen. "Still, tell me what you think of this?" 

* * *

The Scoobies were gathered in the girls' tent, discussing what they had learned that day. Willow had put wards around them, to keep anyone from eavesdropping, without them learning about it. 

"Murray is…strange," said Xander. "He misses nine out of ten cultural references I make…but he has the Special Edition version of Star Wars committed to memory. He didn't seem to know that there was an earlier version." 

"So…not human?" asked Buffy. 

"I don't know," said Xander. "If he was a girl, I could ask him for a date, and if he accepted, we'd know for sure…but…it's almost like he's from another planet!" 

"Pfft!" said Willow. "Like that could happen!" 

* * *

SG-1 was in the lab tent, discussing what they had learned that day. Doug and Charlie were sitting outside, supposedly talking, but they were really there to make sure that the visitors didn't sneak up on them to eavesdrop. 

"I don't know about the others," said Daniel, "but Dawn Summers is amazing!" 

"A little young for you, don't ya think?" asked Jack. 

"No!" said Daniel. He saw Sam's smirk. It was pretty obvious to everyone that the younger Summers girl was crushing on him. "No, I don't mean that!" 

"What do you mean?" asked Jack. 

"Her ability with languages is phenomenal!" said Daniel. "She read something in seconds, that I had spent an hour on." 

"Could she have seen it ahead of time?" asked Sam. "Just pretended to read it there on the spot?" 

"I thought of that," said Daniel, "so I showed her some other things. Some Egyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian. She can read the Sumerian as well as I can. She said she hadn't studied the others yet, but in the little time we had, she was making a really good start at Egyptian. I was tempted to show her some Goa'uld, see what she made of it." 

"You didn't!" said Jack. 

"No, Jack, I didn't, but I think that we should keep an eye on this girl. She could really be an asset to the SGC, once she graduates from university." 

* * *

"What about Carter?" asked Buffy. 

"Smart," said Willow, "but we knew that already. I tried talking to her about what she was doing here, but she was really closed mouth about it. Didn't want to talk about it. I tried talking computers with her, since that seems to be her thing here, and didn't get much. I couldn't really come right out and say I knew she was an Air Force Major with a PhD in astrophysics, and ask her what she thought of Hawkings' theories on time-space distortions around a black hole, or anything like that." 

* * *

"Willow was trying to pump me for information," said Sam. "I think she knows more about us than we've told them. Some of her questions seemed to indicate that she knows I'm an astrophysicist…and she knows something about the field." 

"I got the same impression from Buffy," said Jack. "Not that she knows anything about astrophysics, but that she knows about us. She seemed to be looking for information about my military background." 

"I've been monitoring them, as well as I can with Willow hanging around," said Sam. "I haven't picked up any sort of radio transmissions from them. I don't know how they could have learned anything about us, since they've arrived here on the island." 

* * *

"I heard from Riley," said Dawn. "Managed to have a little chat with him. He says that he's heard of Jack O'Neill, but never met him. O'Neill is legendary in Special Ops. Been involved in just about every hot spot in the world over the last twenty years, mostly top secret 'if he told you he'd have to kill you' type stuff." 

"Could he be an Initiative guy that Riley doesn't know about?" asked Willow. 

"Riley says 'no.' Apparently O'Neill was considered for command of the Initiative, but they were told they couldn't have him. He said that one of the guys on his team worked with O'Neill a couple of years ago. He couldn't say what O'Neill was involved in, but he did say it was 'not subterrestrials.' Everyone seems to agree that the 'Deep Space Radar Telemetry' story is a cover for something, but no one knows what. It could be that O'Neill got himself assigned to it to finish out his last few years before retiring, to flesh out his pension a bit, but he apparently came _out_ of retirement to take the job." 

"Curiouser and curiouser," said Buffy. "So, Giles, how are things going at the dig?" 

* * *

"Dr. Hawley thinks he's found an entrance to the underground tunnels that the radar showed." Daniel pointed to a chart of the site. "It looks like it's sealed by a stone slab that they uncovered this afternoon. It sounds hollow when you tap on it." 

"Any idea what's under it?" asked Jack. 

"Well, there is this." Daniel brought up the image that he had been looking at when Dawn came into the lab. "'And they shall rise up from under the ground, and devour all in their path.' Sounds rather ominous." 

"You think there could be something still alive down there, after thousands of years?" asked Sam. 

"If their boat didn't really sink, something killed that British team twelve years ago," said Daniel. 

"I guess we'll have our weapons ready, when we lift that slab," said Jack. "So…what do we tell the tourists?" 


	9. Into the Dark

**Chapter 9: Into the Dark**

Jack was the last to arrive at the dig the next morning. He was carrying a duffle bag which was full of weapons, in case they needed them. He also had a zat hidden under his bulky jacket. Giles and his people were standing a little way back, watching what was going on with interest. He saw that Buffy had a duffle bag at her feet, similar to his own. The strange 'axe case' was lying on top of it. Jack came up beside her and lowered his bag onto the ground. "Whatcha got in the bag?" 

Buffy turned and smiled up at him. "I'll show you mine, if you show me yours." 

"Oh, I hardly think that would be a fair exchange," said Jack. 

"You afraid you might come up short?" 

"Hasn't happened yet." 

"Jack, we're just about ready here," called Daniel. 

Jack picked up his bag again. "Duty calls." He went over to where Daniel was with the archaeologists. 

Dr. Hawley and his people had finished clearing the overburden of dirt off the stone slab. It was square, a little over a meter on a side. There were two holes in it that appeared to have had once contained some sort of iron fittings, but all that remained of them now was some reddish rust stains. On the opposite edge of the slab from the holes was what appeared to be a hinge, carved from the stone. The archaeologists were all amazed by the quality of the stonework. The slab and the hinge seemed to have been crafted from a single piece of granite. 

Dr. Hawley probed through one of the holes with a rod. "The slab seems to be about ten centimetres thick." He looked around at the rest of it. "It must weigh half a tonne." He probed deeper. The probe went in about another thirty centimetres before it hit something that sounded like rock when he tapped against it. 

"Not much room down there," said Jack. 

"This could be the cover for a stairway," said Daniel. "If it went down that way…" He pointed north, toward the hinge side of the slab. "…that might just be the top step. Here, let's try this." He produced a small television camera mounted on the end of an articulated rod, along with a small halogen light. The combination was barely small enough to fit through the hole. 

Daniel gave the camera to Jerry Morrison, the most junior member of the archaeological team. He snaked the camera through the hole. A cable ran from it back to the laptop computer that was set up on a table. Everyone gathered around; Hawley and the other archaeologists immediately behind Daniel, and the rest of SG-1 behind them. Giles and the others were relegated to the back row, trying to peer around people's shoulders. 

Daniel directed Jerry in how to aim the camera as he watched the display on the laptop screen. As the camera turned a stairway came into view, leading exactly the direction Daniel had predicted. It went down until it faded into the darkness. Daniel adjusted the camera's sensitivity, and more of the stairway came into view, until the bottom of it could be seen. It seemed to lead into a corridor that led away to the north, about ten meters down. 

"Is that water seepage?" Dr. Hawley pointed to some stains on the wall, and the steps. 

"Looks like," said Daniel. "The seal from the slab isn't water tight." 

"Does anything show up on the IR?" asked Jack. 

Daniel switched the camera over to its infrared mode, and the picture displayed on his screen became black and white. It didn't really show anything that they hadn't seen in visible light images. "Nope." 

"The walls look like this passage was cut right into the bedrock," said Dr. Hawley. "You can see some of the veining in the rocks." He pointed to the screen. "Here, zoom in on that. It might be some sort of writing." 

"Jerry, turn the camera twenty degrees to the left, and tilt down five degrees," said Daniel. "Then hold it steady." He adjusted the zoom on the camera to focus it on the place Dr. Hawley had pointed out. Delicate lines ran over the rock. 

Daniel looked at them carefully. "It doesn't look like any form of writing that I'm familiar with, and I'm not seeing anything that looks like any sort of regular pattern. It looks more like some sort of natural phenomenon." 

He had Jerry pan the camera back and forth slowly, recording everything in its range at maximum zoom, in both visible and infrared light, before he pulled it out again. "I think we've seen everything we're going to see with the camera," said Daniel. "It's time to open it up." 

"Are you sure that's wise?" asked Giles. "No need to rush this, there's still lots to excavate above ground, before we go poking under it. Who knows what exposure to the outside air might do to any artefacts that are down there?" 

"We don't have a lot of time here," said Jack. "And it's not like we have to worry about introducing moisture. Looks like it's plenty damp down there already." 

The other archaeologists quickly agreed with Jack and Daniel, and work started to lift the slab. Buffy moved over beside Giles as she watched them. "They seem awfully eager to see what's down there," she said quietly. 

"Yes," said Giles, "and I'm afraid its going to get them killed." 

"If I'm right about what Jack's got in his bag, they may think they're ready for whatever they're going to find…maybe they know what's down there." 

"Sometimes it's best to let buried demons lie," said Giles. 

"But things that have been buried have a nasty habit of getting dug up at the worst possible times," said Buffy. "Better to kill it now, before it comes up and bites us in the ass when we aren't expecting it." 

* * *

A large tripod had been set up over the slab, supporting a block and tackle connected to a rope that had been threaded through the holes. When everything was ready the three junior archaeologists took their positions on the rope and started to pull, taking up the slack in the block and tackle. When the rope went taught, they started to pull harder. Doctors Jackson and Hawley continued to monitor the video image from the camera under the slab while Jack and Murray stood by watching the slab itself. Murray was holding his staff, and Jack had his hand inside his jacket. Buffy knew that he had something concealed under it, and it was a bit big to be handgun. Sam was standing by too, with Jack's bag at her feet. The three of them were positioned so they could set up an excellent crossfire on anything trying to come out from under the slab, without having any of the people in their lines of fire. 

The men pulled harder, and the tripod creaked as the load on it increased. The rope through the holes in the slab slipped a bit as the tension increased, but the slab didn't budge. Buffy glanced at Giles and Xander. "Why don't you give them a hand?" 

Xander started to clap. "Bravo! Well done!" which earned him annoyed looks from just about everyone. 

"Xander!" Buffy whacked his shoulder. 

"Ow! Careful!" He rubbed his shoulder where she'd hit him. 

"Serves you right." Buffy gave him a push. "Go! Help pull!" 

"Yes Buffy, but you've wounded me." Xander wandered over to the men on the rope, still rubbing his shoulder. Giles followed him. 

Even with five of them on the rope, the slab refused to budge. "Could it be locked somehow?" asked Dr. Hawley. 

"I don't think so," said Daniel. "I think it's just stuck. Minerals deposited in the joints by seepage acting like glue." 

"So give it a good whack!" said Buffy. 

"What?" 

"Hit it Danny!" said Jack. 

"With what?" 

Buffy picked up the Scythe case. "Here, let me." She walked over to the slab and started 'tapping' with the handle end of it around the crack at the edges of the slab. Her 'taps' were quite a bit harder than they appeared to be, but she knew that it would take a lot more than what she was doing to break the magically reinforced case. When she was done she backed away again, out of everyone's line of fire, and nodded to the men on the rope. "Try it now." 

They strained on the rope again. At first it didn't look like it was going to work this time either, but then there was a sudden sound like rock breaking, and the slab sprang open a couple of inches. They pulled some more and the slab kept moving, with the grinding noise of rock sliding on rock. 

They kept pulling until the slab was opened to a forty-five degree angle. Dr Hawley moved forward with a couple of poles that had been made for the purpose, and placed them at the corners of the hole, and the slab was lowered down onto them, to keep it propped open. As an extra safety measure the rope was knotted at the top of the tripod to keep the slab from falling back if the poles were knocked away. 

Buffy saw Carter bend down and reach into the bag at her feet. She came back up with four sets of night-vision goggles, three of which she handed out to Jack, Murray, and Daniel before slipping the fourth onto her head. 

"Okay folks," said Jack. "We'll go down and have the first look around. Check it out for any rockfalls, and such, make sure it's safe." 

"I'd like to come too," said Buffy. 

"Sorry." Jack pointed at his head. "Don't have a set for you." 

"But—" 

"No buts!" said Jack. "Besides, this is officially our dig, we have the permits, you don't, and our insurance doesn't cover accidents happening to non-members of our team, the university would have my hide if I let anything happened to you." He looked around at the others. "Let's go." He looked back at Hawley. "We'll keep in touch by radio, let you know if we find anything interesting." 

Buffy stood and fumed as she watched Jack and his people disappear into the hole. She wanted to go after them, it wasn't like Hawley could stop her, but she knew he'd just radio down to Jack if she did, and then she'd either have to fight him and his people, or leave again, so she stood and waited, and fumed while she listened to the voices of Jack, Daniel and Sam coming over the radio as they made their way into the tunnel. She really hated waiting. 

* * *

Daniel stopped to take a closer look at the marks on the wall that Dr. Hawley had originally thought might be some sort of writing. The delicate tracing of lines seemed to sit on top of the rock, not really a part of it. He reached out and touched it with his finger tips, and then pulled them away quickly, some of the lines coming with them. "It seems to be some sort of spider webbing, or something like that." 

"Ugh!" said Jack. "I hate spiders." 

They moved farther down the stairs, toward the tunnel at the bottom. They flipped down their night-vision goggles, and moved into the darkness. 

The tunnel broadened at the foot of the stairs, about two and a half meters wide, and a similar height. As soon as they were far enough away from the stairs that they couldn't be seen Sam pulled a couple of P90s out of her bag, one for her, and one for Daniel. Jack pulled the zat that he had been concealing under his jacket out into the open. 

"Okay, everyone keep your eyes open! Don't want to be surprised by any…falling rocks." Jack really hated that they couldn't talk openly with the civilians listening in. "Murray and I will take point." 

They moved slowly down the tunnel. It seemed to be completely featureless stone with a slight downward slant. Daniel stopped every once in a while to take a closer look at something. "You were right, Dr. Hawley," he said into his radio. "This tunnel seems to have been carved right out of the rock. An incredible feat for someone working with ancient technology." The unspoken message for the others was that it was probably done with some fairly advanced technology. 

They moved farther down the tunnel. The walls stayed just as featureless. A few variations in the grain of the rock, a couple of cracks that water was seeping through, but no signs of any markings that might be writing. 

"If this goes much farther, we're going to run out of room," said Jack. 

"I estimate another one hundred meters before we reach the cliff face, O'Neill," said Teal'c. "There appears to be something up ahead." 

The image in their goggles was brightening, but Jack knew that it wasn't from visible light. Their night-vision gear was sensitive to infrared too, with the heat image displayed in red on top of the green image from the magnified light. Something up ahead was warmer than the tunnel. 

The tunnel opened up into a large underground chamber. Daniel described it over the radio link for the others outside. "We're in a circular chamber, maybe thirty meters in diameter. The roof is a dome, about ten meters high in the center. There seems to be a pile of round boulders in the center of it. Thousands of them, mostly about fifteen centimetres in diameter. They're glowing with a faint heat. The ones on the outer rim are barely above the background temperature, but the ones near the center are several degrees warmer." 

They slowly fanned out as they entered the chamber, Jack and Teal'c moving to the sides, while Sam and Daniel moved toward the pile of boulders. 

Daniel knelt down by the first boulder he came to. He reached out with his hand to pick it up. 

The boulder twitched as soon as he touched it, and Daniel realized his mistake. It wasn't a boulder. Something that looked like a giant spider unfolded itself, and scuttled back away from him on its eight legs. It paused for a second while Daniel stayed frozen in place, too startled to move. It leapt at his face. 


	10. Bugs Mr Rico! Zillions of 'Em!

**Chapter 10: Bugs Mr. Rico! Zillions of 'Em!**

Daniel saw the brilliant flash of light, and felt the heat as the blast from Teal'c's staff weapon passed inches in front of his face. He felt Sam's hand on his shoulder pulling him back toward the tunnel entrance, he was temporarily dazzled by the flash of light. He could hear the whine of Jack's zat firing over and over, and continuous fire from Teal'c's staff. Bursts of fire from Sam's P90 joined the din. 

His vision started to clear, and he saw the seething mass of bugs in front of him. He opened up with his P90 into them. 

"We gotta get out of here!" yelled Jack. "Sam and Daniel, fall back to the tunnel! Teal'c! Cover them!" 

More blasts from Teal'c's staff weapon raked across the spiders in front of him as Daniel turned, and sprinted back to the tunnel entrance, with Sam by his side. They stopped there, and turned back, to provide cover fire for Jack and Teal'c. 

Between them, when they all got to the tunnel, they could keep up a rate of fire to hold the spiders back…until they ran out of ammunition, which wouldn't take long at the rate they were expending it. Jack was also finding that his zat wasn't very effective against the spiders. Sure it seemed to stop anything he hit, but it didn't have anything like the rate of fire of a P90, and the high speed armour piercing rounds that were standard SGC issue often ripped through several of the bugs, there were that many of them. Teal'c's staff was blasting swathes through the bugs. 

"Give me your P90," he told Daniel, "and you and Sam get out of here! Teal'c and I will be right behind you!" 

Daniel fired off one last burst, emptying the magazine. He swapped in a full one before he handed the weapon over to Jack, and took his zat. Sam gave her spare magazine to Jack too, and she and Daniel moved off up the tunnel together. 

Jack waited a few seconds before he signalled for Teal'c to move. They backed up the tunnel together, laying down fire at any of the bugs that followed them. He wanted to just turn and run, but he'd seen how fast those things could move. He didn't think they could outrun them. 

He could still hear Sam and Daniel behind them. He knew that they weren't running either. They were setting their pace by his and Teal'c's, staying close enough to come to their aid if the bugs overran them. He kept backing up the tunnel, firing short bursts at any bugs that he saw. It brought back strong memories of fighting Replicators. God, he hated those things! 

"Teal'c! Can you bring the roof down?" 

"Indeed!" The Jaffa tilted his staff upward, pointing it at a spot in the tunnel ceiling several meters ahead of them. He fired several blasts into it, and the ceiling collapsed, filling the tunnel with rubble. 

"Go!" yelled Jack, and Sam and Daniel took off running. Jack didn't expect that to hold the spiders back long, there had to be holes left they could crawl through, but it should slow them down some. He and Teal'c ran after them. 

"Get ready!" Jack yelled into his radio. "Shut the lid as soon as we're out!" 

* * *

At first it sounded like a burst of static over the radio, but Buffy could hear the noise coming from the tunnel entrance too. She knew it was the sound of automatic weapons firing, and she snapped open the Scythe's case to pull her weapon free. She wanted to go charging into the tunnel herself, but she didn't want to go running through that confined space into a fire fight. Someone might shoot her by mistake. 

Listening to the chatter on the radios soon told her that whatever was happening, Jack's people seemed to be holding their own, and were coming back out. Their voices were excited, but there was no sign of panic in them. She glanced toward Hawley at the computer, and saw him hit a couple of keys on his keyboard. Suddenly four windows popped up on the computer screen, labeled. 'Col. O'Neill,' 'Maj. Carter,' 'Dr. Jackson,' and 'Teal'c.' She quickly realized that they were video feeds from the night-vision goggles that all four were wearing. She could see that they were all falling back through the tunnel, toward the exit with Colonel O'Neill and Murray laying down cover fire for the others. She was really impressed by what Murray's staff was doing. Another look at the window labels, plus what she was hearing over the radios told her Murray's name was really Teal'c. 

She heard O'Neill ask Teal'c to bring the roof down, and she saw the result of his staff blasts, and then the video image showed the blur of them moving up the corridor at a full run. She heard O'Neill's order to shut the lid as soon as they were out. 

Buffy started to tell Giles and Xander to get ready at the tunnel entrance, but she saw that Jerry, Doug and Charlie had gotten there ahead of them. Jerry was already pulling on the rope. The knot at the top was tied so it could be freed by pulling on the slack end. It came loose and he tried to lift the slab enough to take the strain off the supports that Doug and Charlie were ready to pull free. He wasn't quite strong enough. 

"Xander! Help him!" ordered Buffy. 

Xander joined Jerry on the rope, and together they managed to lift the slab off its supports. Doug and Charlie pulled their supports free, and the slab was only held open by Xander and Jerry on the rope. 

Sam and Daniel came running up the stairs and out of the tunnel, followed by Jack and Teal'c a second behind them. "_Close it! Close it!_" ordered Jack as he ripped off his goggles. 

Xander and Jerry let go of the rope. The slab started to fall back down to cover the hole. The rope twisted through the top block with a sound like tearing cloth, and then it stopped so suddenly that they all felt the ground shudder. The rope had jammed. 

Spiders started to boil out of the ground. Jack and the others opened fire on them, but they were coming too fast. 

Buffy leapt, with the Scythe in her hand. It slashed through the rope holding the slab open like it wasn't there. The slab crashed down, crushing half a dozen spiders that were just coming out through the hole. 

She heard screaming, and turned. Jerry was on the ground, with several of the spiders on him. She could see them sinking their fangs into his flesh. She saw Jack raise his gun, but there was nothing he could do with it, without shooting Jerry too. 

* * *

Jack watched the spiders' fangs sinking into Jerry, knowing that he couldn't shoot all of them without shooting Jerry too. He heard Jerry's screams, and thought that maybe shooting him might be a blessing. He raised his gun. 

"Protege!" 

A golden shell formed around Jerry, throwing the spiders away from him. Jack identified the voice that had spoken that word as Willow's, but he didn't have time for that now. He opened fire, killing spiders wherever he saw them moving. 

Sam, Teal'c and Daniel were all shooting too. He saw Buffy moving, faster than he thought a human could move, skipping around, swinging some sort of red and silver axe that cut through everything its blade met. He saw Willow standing still with her hands reaching out, balls of fire erupting from her palms, not unlike the blasts from Teal'c's staff. 

It was all over in a few seconds, and an erie silence fell over the area. It seemed that even the wind stopped blowing. Jack looked around. His team were all still on their feet, as were most of their archaeologists. Jerry was lying on the ground, his body racked with convulsions. He looked at the 'tourists.' Buffy was standing still, looking at him, holding that weird sort of axe thing in her hands. Willow… He saw she was looking his way too, and her eyes… It was almost like looking at a Goa'uld in reverse. They were black, but as he watched the colour quickly returned to them. He looked around at the others, and saw that they all had some sort of edged weapon in their hands. Dawn was holding a sword that had a spider impaled on it. The bug was still quivering. 

"_Who **are** you people?_" 


	11. Who Are You People?

**Chapter 11: Who _Are_ You People?**

"I could ask you the same thing, _Colonel_," said Buffy. "I don't think that automatic weapons are standard issue for archaeological expeditions, not to mention that staff thing that 'Murray' is holding, or Daniel's bug zapper." 

Jack couldn't help noticing that she had called him by his rank, or hearing the quotes around Murray's name, but his thoughts were interrupted by a fresh cry of pain from Jerry, as another wave of convulsions racked his body. 

Sam rushed to his side, and dropped down beside him. "I need the med kit!" Her fingers felt for the pulse at his neck. 

"On it!" yelled Dawn. She dropped her sword, with it's spider, and took off at a run toward the SGC tents. Jack knew she had probably spotted the prominent white case with the big red cross on it while she was hanging out in the lab with Daniel. 

Willow was kneeling on the opposite side of Jerry from Sam. Jack saw her passing her hands over his body. "The spiders injected him with some sort of neurotoxin," she said. "It's spreading fast!" 

He watched Willow close her eyes, her hand hovering over one of Jerry's wounds. There was a golden glow—like one of the Goa'uld's hand healers—over the wound, and a pinprick of something formed in the air between the wound and her hand. It slowly grew into a globule of some sort of purple liquid floating in the air. The liquid suddenly flared and vanished. Willow let out a breath of air that he hadn't noticed she was holding, and moved on to the next bite. 

Willow moved from bite to bite, extracting the poison from Jerry's body, and growing visibly more tired each time. When she reached the last bite the globule of poison didn't disappear in a flash when she was done. She collapsed over him, and the poison dropped back down and splattered across his clothes. 

Dawn arrived back with the med kit. "What happened to Willow?" she asked as she set it down next to Sam. 

"She wore herself out pulling the poison out of Jerry," said Buffy as she lifted Willow off him. 

Sam opened the med kit. She looked at its contents, and wondered if anything in it could help Jerry. "What did she do?" 

Buffy kept cradling Willow's unconscious body in her arms. "She pulled as much of the poison out of him as she could." 

"She healed him?" asked Jack. 

Giles had moved in beside Willow with Buffy. "Healing is more difficult. Whatever damage the poison did, she didn't have much chance to correct. I think she just stopped it from doing more." 

"What about her?" Sam looked toward Willow. "Is she okay?" 

"Exhaustion," said Buffy. "Let her rest, she'll be fine." 

Giles looked at Jerry. "Do what you can for him, keep him comfortable. We'll see if Willow can do more when she wakes up." 

Jack looked back and forth between Willow, Giles and Buffy, wondering what to do. What Willow had done—first the force field around Jerry, and then the blasts she had sent at the spiders from her hands—had looked like what a Goa'uld could do with one of their ribbon devices. The attempt to heal Jerry: like a Goa'uld hand healer. But she had done it all without any visible technological aid. _That_ indicated a very advanced technology, like nothing he'd seen in human hands before…not that he'd actually seen anything in her hands. He'd never seen anything that looked like advanced technology in the hands of the Nox either. They had seemed to be a primitive people when he had first met them. But how could such advanced technology get into the hands of a girl who all their records said had grown up in California? 

That Willow had done it all for one of his people, without anyone asking her, made him think that maybe he could trust her. Especially since she seemed to have exhausted herself to the point where she was now at his mercy… He looked again and saw that Buffy, Giles and Xander were sticking close to her, and reconsidered that last thought. He'd have to get past her friends first. Buffy had shown incredible speed during the brief fight with the spiders, but he hadn't seen anything unusual from any of the others…other than their preference for antique weapons. 

Sam was still working on Jerry, cleaning and bandaging his wounds, with Dawn handing her things from the med kit as she asked for them. Dawn seemed to have a pretty good knowledge of its contents, and usually had the next thing Sam would need ready, when she asked for it. She also didn't seem to mind the sight of blood. It clearly wasn't the first time she'd had to help bandage someone who was badly injured. 

Sam sat back, and looked up at Jack. "Sir, I've done everything I can for him here. I think we're going to need a medevac for him. He seems to have stabilized, but he's still in bad shape." 

"Do it," Jack turned to Dr. Hawley, who, with the rest of the archaeologists, was standing around looking useless. "Call them now." 

"Yes, Sir!" Hawley took off running toward their tents. 

"You two!" Jack pointed to Charlie and Doug, "Get Jerry moved up to the camp, and stay there with him!" 

Buffy looked up at Giles. "You and Dawn do the same with Willow, and _stay_ with her. Keep your eyes open. We might have missed some of those spiders." 

"Right!" Giles and Dawn picked up Willow between them, and carried her away. Xander looked around nervously, watching for any surviving bugs that might suddenly jump out at him. 

Buffy looked toward the slab covering the entrance to the tunnel. "Now we have to deal with whatever you've stirred up down there." 

"Hey!" said Jack. "You came here too!" 

"Only because you started digging," said Buffy. "And now here we are: having to clean up after the military screws things up again." 

"We didn't screw this up!" 

"Yeah, right," said Buffy. "Just tell me one thing: are you guys with the Initiative?" 

"The whatative?" 

"Initiative. You know, the Army guys who deal with this sort of thing." 

"The _Army_ has a unit that does this?" 

"I guess you're not with them." 

Buffy looked around the area. She saw Murray—Teal'c—moving around, with one of the bug zappers, like the one Daniel had had. He was systematically shooting each of the bodies of the dead spiders three times with it. On the third zap the spider vanished. "You might want to save one or two of those," she told him, "Willow or the doctors might need some samples of their poison, if they're going to help Jerry." Teal'c nodded in acknowledgement, and zapped another spider. 

"Xander, why don't you collect a couple," said Jack. If Buffy was going to start telling his people what to do, he could do the same with hers. He felt a little inner glee at Xander's obvious distaste for the task that Jack had given him, and saw him shoot an appealing look in Buffy's direction, only to have her nod her head in a way that told him to carry out Jack's direction. 

Xander looked around, clearly not wanting to touch any of the bugs. "Ah!" He took a couple of quick steps, bent down, and came up holding the hilt of Dawn's sword, with its bug still impaled on it. He carried it gingerly over to where the archaeologists had left some of their sample cases piled up. He dumped some of their rocks out of one of them, and scraped the spider off the sword into it. He started to look around, and saw another, apparently undamaged spider body. He moved toward it. 

"Be careful, Xander Harris," said Teal'c. "A spider that has only been shot once with a zat'nik'atel will only be stunned, not dead." 

Xander took a step back. "Right…so why don't you zap this thing a couple of more times, to make sure for me." 

"Very well." Teal'c shot the spider in front of Xander twice before Xander bent down and picked the creature up _very_ carefully. He held it with just his finger tips, keeping his arms fully extended as he carried to toward the sample box. 

Buffy noticed that Teal'c had lost his hat. She finally saw what he had been covering up with it. Some sort of gold symbol was embossed on his forehead. It looked like a snake inside an oval. "Nice tat. What is it?" 

"It is the symbol of Apophis." 

Buffy frowned. "I've heard of him…one of the Egyptian gods wasn't he?" 

"A false god," said Teal'c. 

"So why do you have his symbol on your forehead?" 

"Ah, we have other things to worry about right now," said Jack. "Like what we're going to do about all those spiders." 

"How many do you think there are?" asked Buffy. 

"Way too many," said Jack. 

Sam closed the med kit that she had been repacking. "We might be able to make an estimate from what was recorded off our goggles." She went over to Hawley's computer and started to access the records. 

"I don't think it matters how many of them there are," said Jack. "We don't have the fire power here to handle them all. I'm going to have to call for reinforcements." 

"Uh…Jack…I don't think we're going to have time for that." Daniel was staring over Sam's shoulder at the computer screen, and looking scared. 

Buffy, Jack and Xander rushed up behind them. It took a moment for Buffy to figure out what she was looking at, the image was tilted almost upside down. When she figured that out, she realized that it was the inside of the stairway, under the slab. One of them must have dropped their goggles on the stairway before they came out. She could see dozens of the spiders crawling across the frame, and something else. Something a lot bigger. 

"Uh-oh," said Xander. "Looks like Shelob is here." 


	12. Killing Bugs

**Chapter 12: Killing Bugs**

"Xander, get out of here," said Buffy. 

"But—" 

"No! If any of those things get past us, you have to help protect the others. Take care of Dawn." 

Xander stood for a moment, and then nodded at her. "You know it." He started to run back up toward the tents, with Dawn's sword still in his hand. He barely broke his stride to stoop to pick up his own favoured axe as he passed. 

"Don't let her or Giles come down here either!" Buffy called after him. "You guys have to look out for Willow!" 

Jack and Sam were loading fresh magazines into their guns. Daniel had replaced his bug zapper with one of the automatic weapons too. Jack looked at Buffy. "You should get out of here too, Miss Summers." He placed a pair of clear plastic safety glasses over his eyes. 

Buffy twirled the Scythe, making it whistle through the air. "I'm staying." 

"I don't know what you think you can do with that thing." 

"Then I guess I'll get to surprise you." 

Jack didn't know what to do with Buffy. He pulled another zat out of their weapons bag, and was tempted to use it on her and then call down Doug and Charlie to drag her back up to the camp, but from the way she was looking at him, he wasn't sure even that would work. She'd moved pretty fast with that thing before, she could obviously take care of herself. He shoved the zat under his jacket. "Just stay out of our way," he growled. "I'd hate to shoot you by accident." 

SG-1 fanned out in an arc around the slab, about ten yards back from it, with their backs to the camp. Jack and Teal'c took the flanks, with Jack on the left, and Sam and Daniel in the center. 

Buffy took a position between Sam and Daniel, and nodded toward Jack. "Is he always this grouchy before a fight?" she asked Sam. 

"It really would be best if you let us handle this, Buffy," said Sam. "We know what we're doing." 

"The Initiative thought they knew what they were doing too," said Buffy. "Thirty-five of them ended up dead." 

"What is this Initiative thing you keep talking about?" asked Jack. 

"You really don't know?" asked Buffy. 

"We really don't," said Daniel. 

"They're a military group that's supposed to deal with the 'hostile sub-terrestrials,'" said Buffy. 

"_Sub_-terrestrials?" asked Jack. 

"Yeah, like these spiders," said Buffy. She saw the incredulous looks on their faces. "What do _you_ think these are?" 

Whatever answer any of them might have been thinking of giving her was cut off by the noise of something hitting the bottom of the slab. It surged up a few inches before it fell back again. 

"Let's sort that out after we've killed them," said Jack. 

"Good call," said Buffy. The slab surged upward again, and this time a pair of large legs came out. The slab fell back onto them, but it didn't seem to do any damage to them. The legs scrabbled at the ground, pulling the head of the creature behind them out of the hole. The smaller spiders started to boil forth too, coming out through the gap held open by the legs. 

SG-1 opened fire. Buffy had to admit to herself that their weapons were effective against the little spiders. They splattered into clouds of blue and purple goo whenever they were hit by a bullet. Teal'c's staff wasn't even leaving goo behind when it hit one of them. 

Jack, Sam and Daniel all had their weapons in single shot mode, but that hardly slowed their rate of fire. All three of them were squeezing off aimed shots as quickly as they could. Teal'c's staff was having a devastating effect, each blast killing multiple bugs. Buffy noticed that he wasn't directing any fire toward the thing trying to claw its way out of the hole, and wondered why for a moment, but she soon realized that one poorly aimed blast could shatter the slab, and the creature was acting rather like a cork in a bottle, keeping most of the smaller spiders trapped behind it. Teal'c didn't want to risk letting all of the spiders free if his attempt to kill the big one left the hole completely open, and unblockable. 

Buffy was starting to hope that she really would turn out to be a fifth wheel in this fight, but then Sam stopped shooting. "Reloading!" she called. The others started to spread out their fire, covering Sam's sector while she swapped in a new magazine. The reduction in fire allowed some of the spiders to get clear from the hole. One of them was coming straight for Sam. Daniel tried to shoot it, but he missed, and the bug was inside their arc, where they couldn't fire on it without risking hitting each other. 

Buffy stepped in front of Sam, and the Scythe sliced the bug in two. "Down!" called Sam, and Buffy dropped to her knees. Sam started to fire again, over her head. 

Buffy rolled clear of Sam's line of fire, and came back to her feet. Daniel was the next to have to reload, and while none of the spiders came close while he was doing so, Buffy saw that several of them escaped from the vicinity of the hole, disappearing over a bank of dirt dug up from the excavation. 

"I'm taking your left!" called Buffy as she ran around behind Jack. She saw four spiders that had gotten clear of their killing zone, and went after them. She made short work of them with the Scythe. 

Buffy looked around. She saw that more of the spiders were escaping, off to the right. She could run around behind Jack and his people, but by the time she got there, some, or all, of the spiders might have gotten away. She considered the accuracy of the fire that they were laying down, and decided she could risk it. "Coming through!" she yelled. 

* * *

Jack cursed when he realized what Buffy was planning to do. If they survived this, he swore to himself that he'd throttle the girl personally. He saw Buffy start to run, and was thankful that she wouldn't be in his field of fire for long. 

It turned out that she never really entered his field of fire at all. She didn't run through it, she jumped _over_ it, with a leap that would have shattered both the Olympic long, and high jump records at once. When she landed she was completely clear of their field of fire, on Teal'c's side of the arc, where she went to work, hunting down and killing more of the spiders that had gotten away from the hole. 

Jack knew that they couldn't keep this up much longer. He was on his third magazine, and he only had two left. And then things got worse. 

The giant spider heaved itself upward again, pulling more of its body out of the hole before it got stuck again. This caused two things to happen. First of all, its body was jammed so tightly in the hole that, for the moment, none of the little spiders were getting out. Jack thought that that was a good thing. Unfortunately it had also pushed the stone lid open so far that it fell back on the far side of the tunnel entrance. If the big bug got free now, there would be nothing stopping the little ones. 

"Teal'c! Kill it!" yelled Jack. He flipped his P90 into fully automatic, and sent a burst of fire at the beast himself. 

His bullets seemed to just bounce off the thing. Blasts from Teal'c staff hit it, and they seemed to do little more than enrage it. Jack pulled out his zat, and shot it several times. The creature didn't even seem to notice. 

The giant spider heaved again, and there was a horrible squelching noise as it pulled its body free from the tunnel entrance. It was followed by a flood of hundreds of the smaller spiders, spilling out of the hole behind it. All of SG-1 poured fire into them, but Jack knew it was hopeless. They couldn't keep this up. His P90 clicked on an empty chamber. 

"_Cover me!_" shouted Buffy. Jack couldn't believe what he was seeing. His hands kept going through the automatic motions of reloading his weapon while he watched her run _toward_ the spiders. 

A blast from Teal'c's staff cut a swath through the bugs ahead of her. Sam and Daniel shifted their fire, shooting everything near her. Jack swore as he finished reloading, and joined his fire with theirs. He saw where she was going, and knew what she planned to do. He didn't think it was possible though. 

Meanwhile Teal'c had switched his fire to the giant spider, since his staff seemed to be the only weapon they had that it even noticed. He directed shots at its head, its body, its legs, trying to find a place where it was vulnerable. He wasn't having any luck. It rose up on its eight, three meter long legs, each as thick as a tree trunk, and started to move toward him. 

Buffy reached the slab that had been covering the tunnel entrance. She swept it clear of spiders with a single swing of her axe. She spun around, close to the ground, with her axe fully extended, and she was suddenly crouching in the middle of an area that was completely clear of bugs. Fire from SG-1 worked to keep it that way while Buffy grabbed the edge of the granite slab, and lifted it. Jack couldn't believe what he was seeing. It had taken five men with a block and tackle to raise the lid off the tunnel entrance, and now, here was Buffy, doing the same thing all on her own. He couldn't believe it, but he was seeing it all the same. Buffy lifted the lid, and pushed it forward, past its balance point, until it crashed back down, sealing the tunnel closed. 

* * *

Buffy grabbed the Scythe and scrambled clear. Even with it closed, the area surrounding the tunnel entrance still had the greatest concentration of spiders. She turned her attention to the next big problem, and it was a _big_ problem. The giant spider was about ten feet tall, and had a leg span of twice that. She couldn't believe that it had managed to squeeze its body through the opening of the tunnel entrance. She had already seen that most of the weapons that Jack's people had did nothing to it. Teal'c's staff seemed to sting it, which was probably why the spider was moving toward him. It didn't look like it was moving very fast, but with each step it took covering about six feet, that look was deceptive. Teal'c was backing away as he kept firing, looking for a place that was vulnerable. 

Buffy could only hope that she would fare better with the Scythe as she ran up behind the creature. 

* * *

'She's _insane!_' thought Jack as he watched Buffy run up behind the giant spider with her axe. If their P90s, zats, and Teal'c's staff couldn't stop that thing, what could she hope to do with an axe? He took aim, and started firing at some of the smaller spiders near her. He might as well shoot those as any of the other spiders running around. He watched as she swung her axe at one of the big spider's rear legs. 

* * *

Buffy swung with all her strength at a joint in the leg in front of her. She felt the Scythe's blade sinking in, but it didn't slice right through it, the way she had hoped. She tried to pull the blade free, but it was jammed in the joint. There was a noise from the spider that she hoped was a cry of pain, and it kicked out its leg. The kick nearly ripped the handle of the Scythe from her hands, as it sent her flying, but she kept her grip on it, and the force of the kick pulled the blade free. 

Buffy rolled to her feet, and saw the spider spinning toward her. It seemed to have forgotten about the annoyance of Teal'c and turned its attention to her. At least now she knew she could hurt it. 

She stood her ground as the spider closed on her. She could see its mouth opening as it reared up. She could see hundreds of what looked like smaller legs surrounding it, moving in waves of motion, to draw anything close into its maw, She could see that the spider was ready to drop down and grab her with the claws on the ends of its front legs. "God, you are the _ugliest_ thing I have _ever_ seen! And that's saying a _lot!_" 

The spider pounced. Buffy rolled to the side, getting herself clear of one of its legs, and she swung the Scythe at the lowest, smallest, joint in the other. This time she did slice clean through it, but she was caught when the spider kicked out with the stump of its leg, and caught her in the head. 

* * *

Teal'c had now seen Buffy Summers injure the spider twice, when his own staff seemed to be doing little more than annoying it. He had initially thought that her first blow had done nothing, and that the spider had simply kicked her away, but after it spun to face her, he could see the blue blood flowing from the joint she had struck. And then he saw her slice off the lowest section of one of its front legs, before it struck her, and knocked her flying back several meters. It started toward her again, and he could see that it was limping on the rear leg she had struck. He took careful aim at the joint she had injured, and fired. 

The joint exploded, and the spider screamed. It whirled away from Buffy Summers, and came toward him again, but this time it was moving more slowly, with an injured leg on both sides. He directed his fire toward another leg joint, but this time he had no effect. He was surprised to see that Buffy Summers was climbing back to her feet again, after the blow she had taken. She didn't get up as quickly as she had before, but he saw her shake her head, and charge toward the spider again, this time aiming for the next leg from the back. He knew what she was planning. If they could take out all of the legs on one side of its body, the spider would be helpless. The rest of SG-1 seemed to recognise her plan too. They were directing most of their fire toward any of the smaller spiders that came anywhere near Buffy Summers or himself, letting them concentrate on the big one. 

* * *

Buffy shook the fog from her head, and moved in on another leg, aiming to damage another joint. This was a larger joint than the one she had managed to cut through, so she wasn't expecting to slice the leg right off. She knew she just had to damage it enough to let Teal'c's staff finish the job, so she was ready to wrench the Scythe free as soon as she struck, and leapt clear of the reflexive kick before it came. 

With three injured legs the spider was definitely slowing down, and it was developing a major list to its right. It wasn't nearly as fast turning toward Buffy this time, and as it turned, it brought its next leg into range of her Scythe. She sliced into a joint in it too, and the spider collapsed, unable to support itself with only the one front leg remaining intact on that side. It still tried to turn itself toward her, and she backed away, letting it keep coming, swinging itself around so that Teal'c would have clear shots at the injured joints. 

Buffy had grown so confident in Jack and the others' ability to shoot the smaller spiders that she had stopped paying any attention to them, and that was her mistake. She didn't notice that as she backed away, circling around the injured spider as it turned, that she had moved into an area where they _couldn't_ protect her, with the big spider down on the ground, blocking them. She realized her error when she felt a stabbing pain in her calf. She looked down and saw one of the little spiders with its fangs in her leg. 

Buffy started to swing the Scythe down, planning to slice the bug off her leg, but a jet of orange fire flashed through it before she could connect. The stabbing pain was replaced by searing heat. There was a hole burned through her jeans, and she could see the scorched skin beneath it from the blast from Teal'c's staff that had grazed her. She almost stumbled, but she managed to keep to her feet. She looked toward Teal'c but he had already redirected his attention to the spider's legs. Two more blasts from his staff into the joints she had injured finished the job she had started. 

Buffy limped back away from the spider, but it had stopped following her. It lay on the ground, thrashing its legs, seemingly having given up on getting to her, or anyone else. She could see that it was still very much alive though, and she'd seen too many demonic creatures that could regrow parts that had been cut off. 

The pain in her leg was fading, and Buffy hoped that it was her adrenaline doing it, but she was afraid that it was the poison. She might not have much time left. She ran forward, and jumped up onto the spider's back, where its head met its thorax, spun the Scythe around in her hands, and drove the stake end of it into the top of the spider's head with all of her strength. The stake penetrated its tough exoskeleton and plunged deep into the spider's head. 

The spider screamed, and bucked under her as Buffy twisted the Scythe in its head, trying to churn its innards into soup. She pulled the Scythe out, and drove it in again. The spider fell silent, and stopped moving under her. 

Buffy jammed the Scythe into the spider's head a few more times to make sure she'd killed it. She didn't think its brain could be all that big, she'd probably missed it the first couple of times. 

She finally rolled down off the spider's back, and her leg nearly gave way when she landed on the ground. She limped a few steps away from it, feeling like the world was spinning around her. And then the ground came up and hit her in the face. 


	13. Aftermaths

**Chapter 13: Aftermaths**

"_Buffy!_" cried Dawn. She took off running away from the relative safety of the camp site. It was only relatively safe up there, because some of the spiders had gotten that far. She, Giles and Xander had killed a few of them. Giles and Xander called for Dawn to come back but she ignored them and kept running. Only the thought of what might happen to Willow, if some of the spiders got to her, kept them from following Dawn. 

O'Neill, and his people moved in around Buffy, keeping the smaller spiders away from her. There were a lot fewer of them now than there had seemed to be only a few minutes ago. Dawn saw Sam lower her gun, and crouch beside Buffy to feel at her neck. 

"Pulse is strong!" said Sam. 

Daniel stopped shooting, and started to swap his magazine. "This is my last one," he said. 

"Save it," said Jack. "We might need the bullets later. Use your zat." He switched weapons himself. 

Daniel nodded, and finished reloading before he pulled out his zat and started zapping bugs with it. 

Dawn reached Buffy and crouched beside her. "Buffy! Can you hear me?" 

Buffy made a sound like a groan, but didn't give any intelligible response. Sam had moved on to examining the burn on the back of Buffy's calf. She recognised it as the result of a staff blast, and looked up at Teal'c. "What happened?" 

"One of the spiders was biting Buffy Summers' leg," said Teal'c. "I shot it. My aim was not as precise as it should have been." 

"It might be a good thing that you hit her too," said Sam as she removed Buffy's belt. She wrapped it around her leg, above the burn, and pulled it tight to act as a tourniquet. "The burn may have partially cauterised the bite, keeping most of the poison out of her system, or at least slowed it down." Sam looked around. The ground was littered with the remains of the little spiders, and farther away she could still see dozens of live ones. "Let's get her moved up to the camp." She looked at Dawn. "Help me carry her." 

"I will carry her," said Teal'c. He handed his staff to Sam, and then easily rolled over Buffy's slight body, and picked her up into a fireman's carry. 

Dawn grabbed the Scythe, and they all moved up to the camp, with Jack and Daniel continuing to keep watch for spiders. 

Teal'c carried Buffy into the lab tent, which was starting to look like a hospital tent now. Willow and Jerry had both been placed on cots in it. Teal'c laid Buffy down on one of the work tables, and rolled her over onto her stomach. Sam moved in to take another look at the burn on her calf. The third degree burn itself was bad enough, and she began the first aid treatment for that. She didn't know what to do about the poison. 

Dawn went to Willow, and gently shook her shoulder. "Willow! Wake up!" 

"G'way K'ndy," muttered Willow. "Le'me sleep." 

Dawn shook her harder. "Willow! You have to wake up! Buffy needs you!" 

"Huh? Wha'?" Willow suddenly sat up, and then dropped her head down into her hands. "Oh, goddess, what a nightmare!" 

"Willow! Buffy got bit by one of the spiders!" 

"What?" Willow's head snapped back up. "Oh no, it wasn't a nightmare, was it? The giant spiders are real?" 

"Uh…yeah." Dawn didn't think that this was the right time to tell Willow that the 'giant' spiders had been reclassified. "One of them bit Buffy. Can you help her?" 

"I can try." Willow started to get up off the cot, but she nearly collapsed before Dawn caught her. 

"Are you sure you're up for this?" asked Dawn. 

"I have to try," said Willow. "Just get me to her." 

"Okay." Dawn pulled Willow's arm around her shoulder, and helped support her as they moved across the tent to where Sam was finishing bandaging Buffy's leg. 

Willow looked at the bandage. "That's where she was bit?" 

"Yes," said Sam. "She's also got a third degree burn there." 

"How'd that happen?" 

"Teal'c used his staff to burn the spider off her," said Dawn. "We're hoping that helped to slow down the poison." 

Willow closed her eyes, and passed her hand over Buffy's leg. "It did…a bit." She staggered, and nearly fell. Dawn caught her again. 

"Willow, are you alright?" 

Willow rubbed her head. "Yeah…fine…I just have to get this marching band in my head to keep quiet." 

"Can you do anything for Buffy?" 

"I'm nearly tapped out Dawnie…I don't think I can, unless…" 

"Unless what?" 

"Can I borrow some of your power?" 

"Anything," said Dawn, without hesitation. "What do I do?" 

"Just let me hold your hand." 

Dawn held out her right hand, and she felt a slight tingle as Willow closed her hand around it. Willow suddenly straightened up. "Whoa!" 

"What's happening?" asked Sam. 

"Oh…nothing," said Willow. "I've just never drawn power from Dawn before, and wasn't quite ready for it. She's…well, let's just say she's got a lot of it." 

Willow passed her hand over Buffy's leg again, and the golden glow emanated from her hand. Sam saw something that looked like smoke start to rise away from the bandages covering Buffy's wound, and condensing in the air between them and Willow's hand, once again forming a small globule of purple liquid that suddenly flared, and vanished. Willow moved her hand up, along Buffy's leg, and over the rest of her body, letting the glow sweep across her. 

The glow vanished, and Willow started to breathe again. "That's it. I've done all I can." 

"Will she be alright?" asked Dawn. 

Willow smiled at her. "Yeah, Dawn. She'll be awake and Slaying in no time." 

"How about Jerry?" asked Sam. "He's still unconscious." 

Willow frowned. "How long was I out?" 

"About an hour," said Sam. 

"That's not good." Willow moved over to the cot on which Jerry was lying. She knelt beside him and held her open palm over his head. She closed her eyes again, and just knelt there, not seeming to do anything for several seconds. 

She suddenly dropped her hand, and sat back on her heels. She shook her head, and opened her eyes. "I can't do any more for him." 

"What do you mean?" asked Sam. 

"I mean, it's up to him now," said Willow. "I've removed all the poison, but there was so much of it. It did a lot of damage. I think he'll recover, given proper care, but there's nothing more I can do now." 

Sam turned to Dr. Hawley, who had been hovering around them. "What's the ETA on that medevac?" 

"Forty-five minutes." 

* * *

Xander's axe chopped another spider in half. "Ha! Take that, you arachnid!" 

"Why do you use such a primitive weapon, Xander Harris?" asked Teal'c. 

Xander held up his axe, and looked at it. "There is much to be said for a good axe. For one thing, you never have to reload it." He glanced to his left, where he saw Daniel zapping another spider. "Now, if I could get my hands on one of those bug zappers of yours…how long do the batteries in those things last?" 

Teal'c gave Xander one of his rare smiles. "A long time." 

"A staff like yours would be nice to have too…as long as I had lots of room, but half the time I'm stuck down in some sewer where I wouldn't have the room to turn the thing around." 

"The firearms of the Tau'ri are compact," said Teal'c. 

Xander filed that 'Tau'ri' away in his mind to ask Giles or Willow about later. "But there are also a lot of things out there that bullets only tend to make angry." 

Teal'c's smile turned into a frown, and Xander decided that this guy could _really_ frown. "I have found that the projectile weapons of the Tau'ri are surprisingly effective." 

'Okay,' thought Xander. '_Definitely_ not Initiative.' Anyone with the Initiative would be able to name half a dozen demon species that laughed at bullets…and if Teal'c was some sort of demon himself, he'd know that too. The 'from another planet' theory was starting to look better to him. That would explain why the Air Force was involved. 

Xander saw Dawn come out of the lab tent, carrying the Scythe. "Oh, hey Dawn, how're Buffy and Willow?" 

"Willow's awake. She pulled the poison out of Buffy, and says she's going to be fine." Dawn held up the Scythe, and Xander saw that it was coated with blue spider goo. "I'm just going to wash this off. She'll be so mad if it gets stained." 

"I'll come with you," said Xander. "She'll be even madder if I let you get bit now." 

They made their way to the stream that ran near the camp, the one that they had been getting their water from, and Xander and Teal'c kept watch while Dawn dipped the Scythe into the fast flowing water. The blood and guts from the spiders was washed away in seconds, and Dawn pulled the pristine Scythe from the water. 

"May I examine that?" asked Teal'c. 

Dawn hesitated for a moment. "Alright. I'll trade you for your staff." She'd noticed that he treated it almost as an object of religious worship. 

Teal'c nodded and held out his staff to her. Dawn took it as she handed him the Scythe. 

Teal'c swung the Scythe through the air experimentally, but it didn't make the singing sound he had heard when Buffy Summers wielded it. Its balance felt perfect though. He could swing it as an axe, hold the grip near the blade and use it to slash, or stab with the spear end, and it felt like a natural extension of his arm, no matter what he did. 

He stopped swinging the Scythe, and took a closer look at its blade. Despite having seen it used against something that neither armour piercing bullets, nor blasts from his staff weapon could penetrate, he could see no blemish in its edge. He brought his thumb up against the edge to test it. 

"Careful," said Dawn. "It's sharp." 

Teal'c pulled his thumb away, and saw the string of red beads of blood along it. He hadn't even felt it cut him. "Indeed." 

Dawn saw a spider moving across the rocks on the other side of the stream. She pointed the staff at it. "So, how does this work?" 

Teal'c carefully placed the Scythe on a rock and stepped up behind her. He reached around her, placing his hands on hers, and adjusted her grip slightly. "You hold it like this, and squeeze with your right hand to fire." 

Dawn squeezed her hand, and the spider was vapourised by the blast from the head of the staff. "Cool!" 

"Indeed!" said Teal'c. He picked up the Scythe again, and held it out to her. Dawn took it while handing his staff back to him. They started back toward the camp. 

Xander spotted another spider, and got it with his axe. "How long till the medevac gets here?" 

"Thirty minutes," said Teal'c. 

"I say, when they get here, we all take off, and nuke the island from orbit," said Xander. "It's the only way to be sure." 

Teal'c stopped, and looked at him. "Is not the use of a nuclear weapon…" He seemed to be searching for the right word. "…overkill?" 

"Have you seen _any_ movies other than _Star Wars_?" asked Xander, but privately he was wondering about the seriousness of Teal'c's expression. Could these guys call in a nuclear strike? 

* * *

"Sir, I think you should dispatch SG-3 here, right away," said Jack, "We seem to have taken care of the main threat, but we don't have the manpower necessary to mop up. We're going to have to sweep this entire island from end to end to kill all these spiders." 

"I can't just send a company of Marines into the territory of a friendly nation, Colonel," said General Hammond. "That's not a 'friendly' thing to do. I placed a call to the Pentagon, to start proceedings on getting authorization, as soon as we got Dr. Hawley's request for a medevac, but I doubt if we'll get it. I was told that someone else would handle it." 

"Who?" 

"They wouldn't say exactly, but I was told that there is a special unit that handles 'situations like this' that is covered as an international counter-terrorism team. They have already deployed to Scotland; someone already informed them that there was something going on there." 

"This unit wouldn't be called 'the Initiative' or something like that, would it, Sir?" asked Jack. 

"I have never heard of a unit with that designation, Colonel. Why do you ask?" 

"Summers and her people kept asking us if we were part of something called 'the Initiative.' They seem to have had some exposure to a military unit that deals with 'situations like this.' And here I thought that 'situations like this' were _our_ job." 

"So did I, Colonel," said General Hammond. "So did I." 

* * *

Jack was surprised by just how easy it was to convince the civilians to leave in the medevac helicopter. With Buffy still unconscious, and Willow looking like she was about to fall over again at any second, it was no problem convincing them that his people could handle things until their reinforcements arrived. In fact the only way he could have kept Dawn off the helicopter with Buffy would have been to zat her. 

Two more unmarked Blackhawk helicopters came in to land as the medevac chopper was taking off. They started to disgorge troops in black uniforms, devoid of any sort of nationality markings. Jack couldn't help noticing that they had brought a lot of firepower along with them. 

The one officer among them who was wearing Air Force blue really stood out. Jack walked up to him. "Major Davis, welcome to my little island getaway. Care to introduce me to your friends?" 

"Yes, Sir. Colonel Jack O'Neill…" Major Davis gestured toward a man with sandy hair, and a face that Jack would have called 'boyish' if it weren't for a rather nasty looking scar that ran across it. "…Major Riley Finn." 

Major Finn held out his hand, and smiled. "Glad to finally meet you, Sir. I've heard a lot about you." 

Jack shook his hand carefully. "That's more than I can say about you, Major." He let go of Finn's hand and looked at Major Davis again. "Care to fill me in on what's going on?" 

"Major Finn's team are trained and equipped to handle creatures like the ones you have found on this island, Colonel. They have extensive experience with this sort of thing." 

"Let me guess: they're that 'Initiative' thing that Summers and her people kept asking about." 

Major Finn's smile faded. "The Initiative no longer exists, but several members of my team are survivors of it, thanks to Buffy." He looked around. "Uh…where is Buffy? I was kinda expecting to see her here." 

"She was just medevaced out," said Jack. "Her people all went with her." 

"She was hurt? How?" 

"She got bit by one of the spiders." 

"Is she going to be okay?" Jack could hear real concern in Finn's voice. 

"According to Miss Rosenberg, she's going to be fine," said Jack. "So, you know her?" 

One of Finn's people smirked. "He used to date her." 

Finn turned and frowned at the man. "Get your men deployed, Captain Miller, and make sure they all know that one bite from one of these things was enough to incapacitate the Slayer." 

"The Slayer?" asked Jack. 

"I'm sorry Sir, but you don't need to know about that," said Major Davis. 

Jack smiled at Major Finn. "Excuse us, for a second." He took hold of Davis's arm and pulled him a little bit away. "What do you mean I don't need to know?" he whispered. "I've got an island crawling with alien bugs, and you bring in this special ops team that seems to know all about 'situations like this' but no one in the SGC knows anything about them? I thought 'situations like this' were exactly what _we_ were supposed to deal with!" 

"I'm sorry Jack," said Major Davis. "If it makes you feel any better, Major Finn, and most of his people don't know anything about the SGC either." 

"Most of them?" 

"He's got a couple of men who were transferred from the SGC," said Major Davis. "We put them onto his team, just in case they ever do encounter something that you do need to know about." 

"Let me guess," said Jack. "We've got a few people in the SGC who were transferred from Finn's outfit." 

"One or two," said Major Davis. 

Jack didn't like hearing any of this. "Are they NID?" 

"No," said Major Davis. "The Initiative was an NID operation, but they are no longer directly involved. Finn's outfit is purely military." 

"So they are indirectly involved, how?" 

"I expect that some of these spiders will find their way into an NID lab for study, but Finn doesn't report to them," said Major Davis. "Now, I would suggest, Sir, that it is time to brief Finn on what his men are facing here…and it would be best if you didn't mention aliens." 

* * *

Buffy awoke to a feeling of motion, and a very loud noise. She tried to move, but discovered that there were straps holding her down. She started to struggle against them. 

"Whoa, Buffy! Stop!" came Dawn's voice. 

Buffy opened her eyes, and saw that she was in a cramped metal compartment. She saw Dawn leaning over her. "Why am I tied down? Where are we?" 

"They're just safety straps, like seatbelts!" said Dawn, nearly yelling to be heard. "We're in a helicopter, and the ride gets a little bumpy sometimes!" 

Buffy looked down, and saw that the straps holding her down did have seatbelt type releases, and her right arm was free to move, so she could get herself loose if she wanted too. She started to reach for one of the releases when the helicopter suddenly lurched. She decided that maybe it was a good thing that she was tied down. She also noticed that her left arm was immobilized, and had an IV tube stuck in it. "What's that?" she asked suspiciously. 

"It's okay, Willow checked it, before she passed out again." Dawn nodded her head toward where Willow strapped down in another bed. Jerry was in a third, with a couple of IVs stuck in his arms, and someone who looked like a medic watching over him. "It's just a saline solution, with some pain killers." 

"What about the spiders?" 

"Jack's people seem to be handling the little ones just fine, and they were expecting some sort of reinforcements to arrive just after we left. They should be fine." 

"What if another big one shows up?" asked Buffy. 

"You aren't exactly in shape to do that again," said Dawn. "If it happens, and they can't handle it, they know where to find us." 

"So where are we going?" 

"Home," said Dawn. 


	14. Home

**Chapter 14: Home**

The medevac helicopter had taken them to the Royal Navy base at Faslane, in Scotland. The medics on board wanted to take Buffy into the base hospital, but she refused to go. They were very surprised by the way she got up, and walked off the helicopter. 

Someone had already been in touch with the base, and had given instructions that they were to be provided with transportation to wherever they wanted to go, so they found themselves being directed toward another helicopter. This one had been outfitted for VIP passenger service, and even had a bar. Kennedy and the group of six Slayers that she was leading through some training exercises were a little surprised when the Royal Navy helicopter that had landed in the yard of their house disgorged five slightly drunk, and very smelly passengers. The blue and purple goo staining most of their clothes was getting pretty ripe by that point. The Royal Navy crew of the helicopter seemed very happy to see them go, and Kennedy overheard one of them mutter something about fumigating it before it would be fit to carry anyone else. 

* * *

SG-1 stayed on the island, trying to learn more about what was held under the ruins while Major Finn's people did a very efficient job of hunting down the spiders. They hadn't been able to re-enter the tunnel directly—the camera that they had re-inserted through one of the holes in the slab showed that the tunnel was still crawling with the little spiders—but Major Carter had noticed that the entrance was large enough to fit a MALP through, so they had one dispatched to them from the SGC. 

* * *

An unmarked van arrived at their house five days later. The men driving it unloaded all of their gear that had been left behind on the island. One of them handed Giles a clipboard with an inventory was attached to it, and asked him to sign it. He did so without bothering to check to see if everything was accounted for. 

* * *

Inserting the MALP, without letting any more spiders out was accomplished with a little help from some flame throwers—Finn's people really did have the most astonishing array of weapons available to them. Jack had asked one soldier why all of them seemed to have a wooden stake as part of their kit, and the man had told him, with a perfectly straight face, that they were just in case they ran into any vampires. 

The MALP rolled down the complete length of the tunnel, and into the chamber at the end of it without detecting any sign of anything out of the ordinary—other than lots and lots of spiders. The rubble from the collapsed roof covered much of the tunnel floor, it had been bulldozed enough by the passage of the big spider for the MALP to roll over it. The MALP circled the chamber without detecting anything that remotely resembled any sort of alien device, or any sign that there were any more tunnels to explore. It couldn't detect any sort of electromagnetic radiation that couldn't be traced to terrestrial sources. There weren't even any inscriptions for Daniel to puzzle over. 

* * *

Willow had created a magical map of the island that had little red dots on it that indicated the location of each and every living spider. They had been slowly disappearing, and one week after they had left the island the only dots remaining were all clustered at the site of the dig, indicating the ones that were still underground. They all vanished in an instant on the morning of the seventh day. 

* * *

In the end, they withdrew the MALP, and Finn's people pumped the tunnel and the chamber full of propane. Everyone stood well back when they detonated it. The amount had been carefully calculated and measured to make sure that it didn't actually blow a hole in the ground, but it did cause the dome to collapse, leaving a visible crater in the ground over where it had been. Then everyone packed up, and went home. 

Someone, from some British agency that Jack couldn't remember the name of, had issued a press release stating that there had been an outbreak of a disease that was killing all the lemmings, or some such rodent, on the island, and that it was now under a quarantine: off limits to all visitors to keep the disease from being spread to other islands. Someone would be monitoring the island carefully for the next few years, to make sure that none of the spiders had survived, before anyone from the public would be allowed back on it. 

* * *

The scoobies were all gathered in the library, trying to figure out just what they had experienced. "I have looked through all of my books for anything on demonic arthropods," said Giles, "and while there are lots of demonic spiders out there, none of them seem to match those things on the island. If they were demonic, they were something new." 

* * *

SG-1 spent the next week trying to dig up more information on Buffy Summers, and the others, without drawing attention to themselves. They met in Sam's lab to discuss what they'd learned. 

"I cross referenced all of our personnel's records with Riley Finn's," said Jack. "I found a couple of guys who have the same hole in their files about five years ago that he has in his. I had a little chat with them." 

"What did they tell you?" asked Sam. 

"Not much," said Jack. "They confirmed without confirming that they knew Finn, and that they had met Summers too. Cited 'national security' and 'need to know' when I tried to ask for details. Wouldn't say what they were doing, but did say that it had nothing to do with extra-terrestrials. I asked if it had anything to do with 'hostile sub-terrestrials' and they got very quiet. And then half an hour later I got a phone call from Major Davis, asking me to stop asking them questions like that." 

* * *

"What do you mean, 'if they were demonic'?" asked Buffy. "What else could they be?" 

* * *

"What about Willow Rosenberg?" asked Jack. 

"I did some more digging on her," said Sam. "Found some interesting things: She's _very_ smart. Pretty much had her pick of any university in the country, and a few overseas too, full scholarships offered from MIT, Harvard and Caltech, but she chose UC Sunnydale. 

"While at university, she was taking a pretty eclectic mix of subjects. Heavy into the sciences: physics and chemistry, especially, but with a lot of other things too: ancient languages, mythology, history, sociology. She also seems to have a strong interest in the occult." 

"There's a strong occult connection with Rupert Giles too," said Daniel. "Much of his academic work has been tracing myths and legends of demons across multiple cultures. He even owned an occult shop in Sunnydale for a couple of years." 

"None of that explains how she can do the things she does," said Jack 

* * *

"Why would an archaeologist, with theories about how the pyramids were built by aliens, be working for the Air Force, on a project that does 'Deep Space Radar Telemetry'?" asked Dawn. 

* * *

"It doesn't fit with any of the technology we've seen," said Daniel. "I think _she's_ doing it. You know Clarke's third law." 

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic," said Sam. "That's how the Goa'uld pass themselves off as gods." 

"There's a corollary," said Daniel. "Any sufficiently advanced magic, is indistinguishable from technology." 

"You're saying she's using _magic_?" asked Jack. 

"We've seen people with telekinesis," said Daniel. "Nirrti has been trying to breed an advanced host for herself, with abilities like that, for generations, maybe she already exists, here on Earth." 

"Are you saying that Willow Rosenberg may be a Hok'taur?" asked Teal'c. 

"Could be," said Daniel. 

"And what of Buffy Summers?" asked Teal'c. "Do you think that her physical prowess is because she too is a Hok'taur?" 

"Maybe." 

* * *

"They're an Air Force unit, that knows about monsters, but _doesn't_ know anything about the Initiative," said Xander. "And Teal'c? Definitely not from around here." 

* * *

Jack turned to Daniel. "Did you learn anything about that Slayer thing? Finn called her 'the Slayer.'" 

Daniel pushed his glasses up his nose, a gesture that Jack had long ago learned meant that Daniel was about to say something that Jack wouldn't like. "What?" 

"Um…there are references to 'Slayers', or something that could be translated to that, in many myths, from all around the world," said Daniel. 

"So?" 

"So, they are always girls, usually young, teenagers even. According to one source I found, umm…" Daniel flipped to a page in his notebook and read from it. "'In every generation there is a Chosen One. She alone will stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer.'" 

"Vampires?" asked Jack, thinking about the wooden stakes that Finn's people all carried. 

"Demons?" asked Sam. 

"Forces of darkness?" asked Teal'c, not wanting to be left out. 

"That's the legend," said Daniel. "I've found similar accounts in several languages. The Slayer is a mystical warrior, chosen to protect the Earth from the demons." 

"What about that axe of hers?" asked Jack. "Anything on it?" 

"There are some very old references to a special weapon used by the Slayer, but nothing specific," said Daniel. 

"Buffy Summers' weapon was of very advanced construction," said Teal'c. "No known material could have kept so sharp an edge, after such use, not even trinium." 

* * *

"And those weapons of theirs," said Willow. "The bug zappers, and Teal'c's staff—I didn't feel _any_ magic from them, but there is no way I know of to pack an energy source powerful enough to do what they did, into something that small." 

* * *

"You know, there is no way that giant spider could have been a natural animal," said Sam. 

"What do you mean?" asked Jack. 

"There's a reason why insects tend to be small, Sir. Their basic body design can't scale up. They aren't strong enough." 

"But I thought that if you scaled a spider up to the size of a man, it could lift a car," said Jack. "Works for Peter Parker." 

"That assumes that strength scales linearly with size, Sir, but it doesn't. It follows a square-cube law." 

"Skip the math." 

"Effective strength scales inversely with size. If you make something twice as big, it is effectively only half as strong. Even the _little_ spiders were too big. They shouldn't have even been able to lift their own body weight, let alone run or jump the way they did." 

"This spider's exoskeleton was exceedingly strong," said Teal'c. 

"But it wasn't," said Sam. 

"Huh?" asked Jack. "Bullets bounced off the thing! Teal'c's staff couldn't even singe it!" 

"After it was dead, I was able to cut off pieces for analysis with my knife, Sir," said Sam. "It came back as perfectly normal chitin, just like a regular spider's exoskeleton. It shouldn't have stopped our bullets, and those legs wouldn't have been strong enough to hold up its body without breaking under the strain." 

"So, how come our weapons didn't do anything to it?" asked Jack. 

"I don't know." Sam gave him a sort of a shrug. "Magic?" 

* * *

"When I called the spiders 'hostile sub-terrestrials' they did seem to be pretty surprised by the 'sub' part." Buffy looked around the table, at the expressions on everyone else's faces, and saw that they were all thinking the same thing, even though none of them wanted to be the first to come right out and say it. 

* * *

"So," said Daniel. "We've got a spider that couldn't possibly exist, a girl with advanced 'magical' abilities, with a strong interest in the occult, a man who also has a strong interest in the occult, and had made a career out of researching legends of demons, and a girl who seems to be some sort of chosen demon fighter. This girl has a magic weapon that could injure something that our weapons couldn't touch, until she softened it up for them. Then the government sends a team that specialises in 'sub-terrestrial' creature extermination to the island to do the mop up." 

* * *

"Okay." Buffy took a deep breath. "Looks like we were fighting a bunch of _alien_ spiders." 

* * *

"Oh, for crying out loud!" said Jack. "Are you trying to tell me those were _demon_ spiders?" 

**THE END**


End file.
